My Sims 3 Uber-Rant

[ElementMK]

Note: This was and is a huge rant I've been working on for quite some time. It was originally almost four times as long, but due to a crash, I lost a lot of that work. I've decided to publish what I've salvaged and possibly continue this rant in the future. I hope it gives you some perspective on TS3.

I'm just a fan of The Sims series, but I've felt that the advent of The Sims 3 has taken the game in a direction I wish it did not.

I'm going to go in depth about The Sims 2 v. The Sims 3 and the four current expansions for The Sims 3. Or, in other words, I'm going to whine about The Sims 3.

What do I find wrong with just base-game Sims 3?

Number 1: The Graphics

Even back in 2004, the newly released Sims 2 was not a graphical marvel. However, it was never intended to be a realistic life simulator when it came to graphics. Instead of going for a realistic look, it went for something more stylistic. This had three main benefits:

First, it kept the game from tumbling into something known as uncanny valley, a concept that says an emulation of a human being that is almost accurate actually ends up being ugly and somewhat unsettling. We've all seen this before (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_n6KT9nukU#t=00m56s). Instead, the “Sims” of The Sims 2 are stylized and cartoonish enough to avoid uncanny valley, but they're still appealing and obviously people.

Second, it meant the game could run on nearly any computer at the time. The simple textures used in The Sims 2 kept the system requirements low while still making it a great-looking game. And seeing as The Sims series mainly appeals to casual gamers who have no interest in high-end gaming PCs, it makes perfect sense.

Third, it makes the game timeless. Other games, like old FPSs that were considered cutting-edge at the time, really don't age very well. They often look muddy and ugly as time goes by. The Sims 2 avoids this. The game still looks crisp and attractive even 7 years after it was released.

The Sims 3 tries to continue to appeal to these three points, but manages to fail each one to some degree. Let's get the obvious one out of the way:

PUDDINGS. The Sims of The Sims 3 are either on the very edge or are quickly falling into uncanny valley. Though good looking realistic human characters are entirely possible in modern high-end games, The Sims 3 has to battle with trying to be realistic without having system requirements that are out of the capabilities of the average causal user. The end result is ugly and, frankly, forgettable. The Sims of The Sims 2 were all unique while clearly unrealistic, and real people or high-end emulations thereof are unique and realistic. The Sims 3 is forced to find a middle ground, which means we end up with bland looking characters that are pretty much indistinguishable from one another. And without that uniqueness, our drive to tell a story with them or even care about them is broken.

This middle ground business infects the rest of the game, too. Trees and shrubbery at max settings look quite good, but on low settings, those trees don't lower in quality; they flat-out disappear on other lots and the town view. And since they're one of the most graphically taxing items, say hello to a barren Sunset Valley that looks like a turd.

Don't get me wrong, TS2 had this too if you had all the settings at their lowest (and trust me, I've been there), but you could create a fairly good-looking game with a little compromise in the graphics settings. TS3 looks terrible if only one of its more visible settings is toned down to its lowest.

But that's just the obvious stuff that affects low-end PC players. If you actually have a rig that can run things at the max, you get the middle ground graphics with some “next gen” features taped on with the love and care of a fifth grader trying not to fail art class. You get some dandy bloom lighting that makes everything glow like it's cartoonishly radioactive, broken lighting that is very selective about where it will spread (other lots and upper floors are always iffy), and if you're extra lucky, the game will run at 200 FPS for no other reason than to fry your graphics card as quickly as it possibly can. Hooray!

How this could be fixed in the next iteration: If the power of technology stayed the same, I would suggest going back to stylized graphics. On the other hand, since technology evolves so quickly, and old high-end becomes new affordable mid-range, this problem will probably solve itself in a potential TS4.

However, stylized graphics would allow the developers to focus less on drawing or creating the objects of TS3 and focus more on gameplay.

And what do you know? That's point #2.

Number 2: The Gameplay

Where to start? Gameplay is a very broad concept, so there's a lot of ground to cover. I'll start with the most obvious gameplay frustration: RABBITHOLES.

Rabbitholes are, in many ways, the biggest complaint TS3 gamers have. It's not hard to see why. It's not interesting in the slightest to watch a building with only minimal control over what's going on inside it. Since rabbitholes represent places like restaurants, job locations, and movie theatres, you'll be staring at them for quite a bit of the game. The Sims 2 had sims disappear from the lot for jobs, but you'd think there would be a step forward for The Sims 3, not just a pretty building instead of a disappearing carpool. Imagine actually seeing and controlling your Sims as they experience hard work in a military academy, or urgent situations happening in the hospital. Each job could, in some ways, become games within themselves. I still don't know how to make the business job fun, though. Though the Ambitions expansion tries to alleviate this, it fails for reasons I'll point out in a future post.

If you've played Fallout 3, imagine visiting a location, like Megaton or Rivet City, only to find that your character disappears within the doors of that location. You're forced to stay looking at the outside as they conduct business. That would not only kill immersion, but kill the fun, too.

But, says the genre-savvy player, The Sims 3 isn't a role-playing game! It's a simulator.

Sure. By definition, this is true. Playing The Sims 3 tells a different story. There are skills to grind, levels to be gained through jobs, opportunities (aka quests) and a lot of crap to collect. So why is it okay for the developers to take the easy way out an lock us out of the most interesting locations in the game?

Futhermore, the RPG elements often seem to be the only thing beyond an open world that was added to make TS3 a new experience. But they're poorly implemented and quickly ignored. Simply giving butterfly species #3 a palette swap and throwing it somewhere in the world is hardly an interesting piece of content. Many of us never looked back after finishing a collection for the first time.

That's where my rant ends for now. I still want to flesh it out in the future and even cover the expansions. However, I'd love to hear your comments and see where you agree or disagree.

[fraroc]

What do you expect Element Leaf? EA is nothing more than a bunch of money-loving (CENSORED) that take enjoyment in creating inferior products with fraudulent advertising in order to line their pockets with the hard earned money of everyone else like a bunch of fucking leeches. EA games is like any other parasitic blood sucking business.

[emilyhwithlove]

This is just my little tidbit - your opinions are yours and fine, and mine are mine(:

I agree with what you said about rabbitholes being quite boring, but since there are sooooooooooo many different jobs and places to work, it would totally kill my laptop and give some serious lag. Also, I think that rabbitholes absolutely suck when you are playing a single Sim or a couple, but if you play biggg families like I like to, they're quite a relief to know that they are safe in their building, not doing anything I don't want them to, and I don't have to micromanage them. :)

[missy harries]

I've had an on off love affair with TS3 since it came out and I offten wonder if my attempts to play are futile since my bursts never last long. I do agree with you though, TS3 is a dumbed down game thats lacking in most respects. The only great thing I'd have to say about it is the create a style tool, that has spoilt me......

[fraroc]

Thank CHRIST the EPs had redeemed the game and brought the entire Sims Series from the abyss. Ambitions,Generations and World Adventures did things that we never thought possible in The Sims, Late Night brought back many things we love about The Sims and I'm praying to every single Catholic saint that Pets is the best EP yet.

But I agree with you whole heartedly, I find it very disrepectful for EA to release such an inferior base game compared to TS2 and TS1's

[Flaygor]

With all due respect to your opinions, that rant is a load of utter rubbish. My main point being, apart from the fact you trawl out stuff we've all seen a thousand times, is you complain about Sims 3 placing demands on low end users (facial graphics), and then proceed to again complain about features that are limited to save the demands of low end users (rabbitholes).

Seriously, get a change of attitude or go back to playing Sims 2.

I used to spend all my time complaining about how slow my game was, how horrible EA were... ete, etc.

Then one day I upgraded my PC, put in a 64 bit OS, added more expansions, cranked up the graphics and started to HAVE FUN INSTEAD OF MOANING ABOUT IT! Now I have tons of families that do all sorts of crazy stuff and my fun bar is always full! :rofl:

My advice to you is to stop your "WIP rant" :rolleyes: and go start having fun with this excellent and entertaining game. You will thank me for this later! :D

Must also give kudos to Twallan for his excellent mods which I installed as part of my upgrade. If you haven't tried playing with Story Progression and Master Controller please do so (back up first of course) as they make the game come alive and give you total control over the whole town. Then you can edit any "pudding" Sims such as Claire Ursine, make the Altos friendly or fix Tamara Donners nose, and have all pretty Sims running around. Nice!

[KaiRuh]

What did Generations do that wasn't possible before? For that matter, what did WA really do that was possible before? The adventures themselves are new (though moving toward a roleplay game, which many players are not pleased with), but we could go to other worlds in TS2 as well. The only one that brought something absolutely new was Ambitions, and it did such a poor job of it: Professions are fun to play the first two or three times around, and then they get boring and are generally avoided because you have the same two or three tasks that you do repeatedly every work day, and that's incredibly dull.

I don't think I can agree that the expansion packs improved TS3 much at all. I do still play the game, but I have such a love-hate relationship with it... I never had that with TS2. I always loved that game. The only thing that ever bothered me was loading screens, but that was because I was playing on a low-end computer. Now they don't even begin to pose a problem for me.

[ElementMK]

With all due respect to your opinions, that rant is a load of utter rubbish. My main point being, apart from the fact you trawl out stuff we've all seen a thousand timesI think it makes sense to start with what we already know to ease readers into problems they may have not noticed.

is you complain about Sims 3 placing demands on low end users (facial graphics), and then proceed to again complain about features that are limited to save the demands of low end users (rabbitholes).If the rabbitholes were built to save on processing power, why did Ambitions come out just a year later without upping the system requirements?

Seriously, get a change of attitude or go back to playing Sims 2.The Sims 2 has passed. There are features in TS3 that make TS2 hard to enjoy. This rant is not how TS2 is better than TS3, per se, but more about what could be fixed in a TS4.

I used to spend all my time complaining about how slow my game was, how horrible EA were... ete, etc.

Then one day I upgraded my PC, put in a 64 bit OS, added more expansions, cranked up the graphics and started to HAVE FUN INSTEAD OF MOANING ABOUT IT! Now I have tons of families that do all sorts of crazy stuff and my fun bar is always full! :rofl: I recently upgraded my computer, too, and have every expansion. I have pointed out the problem with TS3 expansions, though, but I'll drag it up on your behalf.

"See, back in TS2 days, every odd-numbered EP was a unique idea, and every even-numbered EP was a remix of something from TS1 days. Only AL broke this trend. Juansfalcin has the right idea when it comes to the EA treatment of TS3 EPs. As it stands, every even-numbered EP is supposedly the "original" one, though to me they see aimless and FreeTime-esque. And who here has fond memories of FreeTime? It pales in comparison to the first time each of us installed Seasons or Nightlife, I bet.

The excitement in installing an EP is no longer there for me. Nothing in *any* of the current TS3 EPs hasn't been done before in some manner, and both stuff packs and EPs are consistently threadbare as EA tries to make a buck on its Store."

I hope you can see why I don't find TS3 expansions to be very refreshing.

My advice to you is to stop your "WIP rant" :rolleyes: and go start having fun with this excellent and entertaining game. You will thank me for this later! :D Even good products can be improved.

[zigersimmer]

I didn't make through the entire OP. I stopped at the whining about the graphics for the sims. In my experience, no one over the age of 12 wants "stylized graphics", which is really just a euphemism for entirely unrealistic looking japanamation silliness.

[ElementMK]

I didn't make through the entire OP. I stopped at the whining about the graphics for the sims. In my experience, no one over the age of 12 wants "stylized graphics", which is really just a euphemism for entirely unrealistic looking japanamation silliness.I am inclined to disagree. It's a shame you didn't read all the way through, as it's only two pages of writing (in Word, anyway).

However, I suggest you watch this video (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/3201-Graphics-vs-Aesthetics). If you had continued to read my post, you would know that I am in support of making the game look even more realistic in future iterations if regular computers can support it. I only stated that TS2's simple graphics worked during the time it existed, where as TS3 graphics have a dilemma between realism and processing practicality.

[laceyharkness]

I too didn't bother to read this through the whole way, because simply, I'm sick and tired of reading the same whining posts over and over. And I'm sorry ONLY two pages of writing? To say the same things that have been said repeatedly?

I also find your complaint that you can't go back to sims 2 a little silly. You parade as vastly superior, but because what? It doesn't have an open world you can't play it anymore?

For the graphics thing, it's one of those things that are dilemnas for every game ever made, and personally, I think Sims 3 does a wonderful job handling it. I actually prefer the sims in Sims 3 and have not run into many issues with everyone looking the same. Yes, there are some sims who look like others, due to restrictions of clothing and slider options, even with cc and slider hacks, but over all, I can tell Zelda Mae from Bonnie Wainright, etc.

Rabbitholes. Well, I personally think they are in fact overused, but not a bad concept. Who really wants to watch a sim at work for eight hours doing nothing but office work? And there are work arounds to the rabbitholes if you just try. If you have WA for example, use the registers and build your own bookstore, cafe, grocer that's open. The decor is there to do so, and I've seen several done, and done very well, right here on MTS, as well as ways of opening up the theater. Yes, EA should have done it themselves, but it's not like there aren't tools out there, many supplied by EA themselves. One of the appealing things about Sims is how much you can build for yourselves, including houses and venues and even rabbitholes.

These are of course my own opinions, just as you have yours. Though personally, for as long a rant as this, I would think a blog post would be better suited than a forum.

[Flaygor]

Well, I certainly didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition! :jest:

Thank you Element Leaf for taking the time to address .... every.... single... point .... in my response with a delightful and skilful evasiveness, you're not a politician are you?
Most of my posts usually only elicit a dull grunt.

I do hear what you're saying, really, but I think you are missing my point and taking my comments to heart too much. My point, and this is supported by other comments on this topic, is that you will get more from the game if you free yourself from pulling it to bits and really get into enjoying what does work. Lets be positive and help others find the good things. I'm trying to help you relax here!

And I mean, seriously, how can you even mention Sims 2? I played it loyally for years, got Sims 3 and NEVER played it again, not even once, like comparing apples with *erm* something totally not like apples.
I do miss the poker table though.... :(

[Perfectionist]

I actually like my sims faces...I think they're pretty realistic. I think you should look for the positive things in the game, and if you really can't, don't play it.

[ElementMK]

I too didn't bother to read this through the whole way, because simply, I'm sick and tired of reading the same whining posts over and over. And I'm sorry ONLY two pages of writing? To say the same things that have been said repeatedly?Sadly, the rest of the rant became more thoughtful and original, at least in my mind, as I wrote about things like the lack of fluidity (a la anchoring) in the games. It was something that was apparent in TS2, too, but I hoped would be addressed in this game. There was also the problem of animation limitations bringing the capabilities of the game to a grinding halt (and how programs like Blender could fix it). Seriously, the game could be exceptionally immersive if it had more animators behind it. There was also a LOT of writing about stuff I'd like to see in TS4. If I had just that section, it may have been all I posted. That was all lost in a Blue Screen, though, so it'll take time for me to get the will to retype it. Perhaps I should have waited until I was ready to do so.

I also find your complaint that you can't go back to sims 2 a little silly. You parade as vastly superior, but because what? It doesn't have an open world you can't play it anymore?Well, there are two things that hold me back. One, I feel that I have experienced the entirety of the game. I've played countless hours of it. Two, my hardware is improving, but it's leaving behind support for features TS2 uses. As such, it's hard to get it to play properly. It's not vastly superior, either, it just did some things right that I'd like to see implemented in a sequel.

For the graphics thing, it's one of those things that are dilemnas for every game ever made, and personally, I think Sims 3 does a wonderful job handling it. I actually prefer the sims in Sims 3 and have not run into many issues with everyone looking the same.Truth be told, I sort of wonder if I think the Sims look so similar because they do reflect actual people. Maybe we're all bland and pudding-like in real life! /conspiracy

Rabbitholes. Well, I personally think they are in fact overused, but not a bad concept. Who really wants to watch a sim at work for eight hours doing nothing but office work? As I said, I have no idea how to make that one interesting. The military or medical careers are better suited to my concept. Heck, we have many objects from TS2 and TS3 that could open them up right now! Also, we find it fun to guide our virtual people through the tedium of life itself. Who knows how an office job might be? d:

And there are work arounds to the rabbitholes if you just try. If you have WA for example, use the registers and build your own bookstore, cafe, grocer that's open. The decor is there to do so, and I've seen several done, and done very well, right here on MTS, as well as ways of opening up the theater. Yes, EA should have done it themselves, but it's not like there aren't tools out there, many supplied by EA themselves. One of the appealing things about Sims is how much you can build for yourselves, including houses and venues and even rabbitholes.I have been trying this method for a while. I find it to work fine for non-job rabbitholes, though the unofficial workaround is likely not as good as an official opening up of these locations.

These are of course my own opinions, just as you have yours. Though personally, for as long a rant as this, I would think a blog post would be better suited than a forum.I sort of agree, in fact, this was actually intended to be the script for a video. However, I really like having people deconstruct my rant or arguments and make valid points or improvements of their own. A forum is hands-down the best way to do that.

[RoseCity]

I think it makes sense to start with what we already know to ease readers into problems they may have not noticed.
Isn't this a little bit condescending - as if, if you're enjoying the game, it's because you just don't understand that there's a lot wrong with it.

If the rabbitholes were built to save on processing power, why did Ambitions come out just a year later without upping the system requirements?

Because people said they hated the rabbit holes and wanted to follow their sims to work? Ambitions is my least favorite EP (although I love Twinbrook) just because following your sim to work is so deadly boring, just like real life often is. It's one thing to work in the real world for a paycheck and another to work in the sim world - because in Ambitions you are often working, not the sim. It could probably have been implemented better, but I don't know anything about making a game like this. As has been said many times before, open restaurant and diner venues would be nice, but WA and LN made moves in that direction.

Just some other thoughts - One thing I would say about the way the sims look in Sims 2 - if you play Sims 2, I think you've become used to looking at the Sims 2 sims and thus they look beautiful or quirky or whatever to you. But I never played Sims 2 and they don't look all that lovely to me - in fact, they look kind of ugly. But now that I've become conditioned to like the way Sims 3 sims look, I'm no longer able to judge their appearance objectively either.

Perfection can't be found in the real world - why should it be found in a sims game? A perfect world would also be a deadly boring world. To me, limitations are what make anything interesting. The limitations we encounter require us to make choices, use our imaginations, use what we have, what's already there.
(But I am curious to know what the Sims 4 will be like, if there is a Sims 4.)

[ElementMK]

I actually like my sims faces...I think they're pretty realistic. I think you should look for the positive things in the game, and if you really can't, don't play it.There are positives, though I can't really criticize positives. d:

Open world feature? Keep that in, for sure. CASt? Damn straight. Less linear skill growth? I'll drink the Kool-Aid. TS3 is, in my opinion, better than TS2. However, I don't believe it made as much growth as it could have.

If you want, I'll get back to my Word document and type up my TS4 wishlist again. Without it, I can see how the OP seems more like a "TS2 WAS BETTER EA SUX" rant than an even-handed critique/fanboy rant intended to make the next step in this franchise even better.

[ElementMK]

Isn't this a little bit condescending - as if, if you're enjoying the game, it's because you just don't understand that there's a lot wrong with it.I didn't intend for it to be interpreted that way. I am not the superior gamer attempting to put you plebeians in line with my skills of observation. d:

It's more like ... well, have you ever played a game and noticed that something just bugs you, but you can't put your finger on what it is? It happens to me all the time, and I'd like to make an attempt to find the cause of those little annoyances.

Because people said they hated the rabbit holes and wanted to follow their sims to work? Ambitions is my least favorite EP (although I love Twinbrook) just because following your sim to work is so deadly boring, just like real life often is. It's one thing to work in the real world for a paycheck and another to work in the sim world - because in Ambitions you are often working, not the sim. It could probably have been implemented better, but I don't know anything about making a game like this.SO TRUE. Ambitions was tedious beyond the work-at-home positions and the firefighter. I think it had more to do with EA pushing a point-and-click adventure as opposed to a simulation.

Take the ghostbusting profession, for example. Click on ghost, collect money, repeat. The firefighting profession, on the other hand, allowed you to choose what you'd spend your time doing before the next emergency. It was shallow, but it's an example of what these jobs could be.

Some people also enjoyed the open-endedness of the architect profession, but I found it too glitched to be enjoyable.

Just some other thoughts - One thing I would say about the way the sims look in Sims 2 - if you play Sims 2, I think you've become used to looking at the Sims 2 sims and thus they look beautiful or quirky or whatever to you. But I never played Sims 2 and they don't look all that lovely to me - in fact, they look kind of ugly. But now that I've become conditioned to like the way Sims 3 sims look, I'm no longer able to judge their appearance objectively either.This is an interesting thought. Though I started with TS1 and never had an issue when moving up, you bring up a good point. I suppose I'll have to see how I feel when TS4 screenshots start to pop up.

Perfection can't be found in the real world - why should it be found in a sims game? A perfect world would also be a deadly boring world. To me, limitations are what make anything interesting. The limitations we encounter require us to make choices, use our imaginations, use what we have, what's already there. I certainly don't want a perfect world for my Sims (though what they have now is certainly ... idealized). I want a deeper world, a world with so many different routes and options that it takes one's imagination to figure out where they want to go with their Sims!

[Theatrhythm]

when the sims 2 came out my computer was still the only good for sims 1 but that didnt mean
that the sims 2 was "too strong for average computer" graphics, it meant that my computer wasn't the average anymore for computer games

it wasnt the sims 2 fault, same with sims 3...

[TMBrandon]

I don't know, I'm too lazy to rant against your rant(s) at the moment but I just wanted to point something out..
I watched that video fully and you said that "TS3 graphics have a dilemma between realism and processing practicality." when in that video, which you were trying to make a point in the difference of Graphics and Aesthetics to that poster (I think..), it says, realism has nothing to do with the graphics but rather the graphics are about processing and rendering through, which you said..Unless I heard that wrong, just wanted to point that out..

Also one last thing, if you're going to criticize a game for it's Aesthetics or Graphics, you can't take a game that is 4 years+ or so in advancement of technology to compare and make a point because technology as known and says is always changing, hardware is upgrading and more things are becoming doable..Which is one thing I believe EA was looking at when coming out with TS3, which is probably the reason everything runs slower on the older PC's..Especially when the market is growing and everyone is just now replacing their old box computers or just old computers in general..And the reason why I'm even talking about this is because you said "I'll have to see when TS4 screenshots start to pop up" well to tell ya, it's probably not going to be until about 2-4 years before we even hear confirmation of TS4, if there is one, yet alone see a screenshot of the game..

ALSO! I remember reading something about how EP's begin to get more unoriginal and/or already done.. Well if you take a look at the official forums and when the game was first coming out, ALL everyone wanted/want is to have things back from TS2..And EA is doing this while if you look at the pattern, it tends to go Unoriginal EP, Original EP, Unoriginal EP, Original EP and now once again Unoriginal EP..But even with that yes there may be little snippets to include TS2 features because they want to give us something back..But in the end the entire concept is completely different and it's way more integrated..I mean obviously World Adventures was a downfall of Bon Voyage or something, but Ambitions was a like step in between Hobbies, Late Night was a HUGE step up from Night Life and Apartment Life in many cases but they did leave a lot out that could've of been included, and Generations was very helpful for getting a lot of needed and missed features back..And well now, Pets, and from what I've seen with my two own eyes, read and heard, well Pets is a highway to heaven, it's definitely hundreds of steps up from TS2 Pets..And I'm pretty sure Seasons will be as well, and any other EP from here on out, and I just hope that is the full case. Now, I have actually did a partial rant from what I wanted to say but didn't want to type, but again I respect your opinion, but a bunch of stuff you said has a backfire. And I'm sure what I said up here does as well.

[ElementMK]

Also one last thing, if you're going to criticize a game for it's Aesthetics or Graphics, you can't take a game that is 4 years+ or so in advancement of technology to compare and make a point because technology as known and says is always changing, hardware is upgrading and more things are becoming doable..Which is one thing I believe EA was looking at when coming out with TS3, which is probably the reason everything runs slower on the older PC's..Especially when the market is growing and everyone is just now replacing their old box computers or just old computers in general..And the reason why I'm even talking about this is because you said "I'll have to see when TS4 screenshots start to pop up" well to tell ya, it's probably not going to be until about 2-4 years before we even hear confirmation of TS4, if there is one, yet alone see a screenshot of the game..I'm running out of steam to reply to everyone, but I'll clear up this part. When I watched the video, I interpreted graphics/fidelity as the level of realism or detail the game has. Style was the interpretation and application of that detail, in my mind. So, I'd like TS4 to look graphically better, in that it looks more realistic, but also stylistically better in that it's just nice to look at. I hope that clears things up.

[van Dorn]

I find it hilarious that people play so they can rant about it and tell people how they hope it won't be as bad in the Sims 4. Which won't be coming out for a few years. Of course, I might have just described the video game critic system.

[TheLB]

I'm so sick and tired of people complaining so much. Really, if the game sucks so bad, why do you play it and then frequent a forum about it? If you hate the developer, then vote with your wallet and stop buying their products.

It's not EAs fault if your computer can't handle the game and starts jerking or slowing down. That is entirely on your hands to get a proper system that can run the game well. And at the same time, you complain about rabbitholes. You can't have it both ways. Either you have them disappear in the building or you sit there and render every single sim in said building. But if you want to abolish rabbitholes entirely and you still have problems during normal gameplay, I say good luck to you the next time your sim wants to go to a sports game. How can you begin to compare The Sims 3 to Fallout?
You know what you can do in The Sims 3 if rabbit holes bore you that much? Fast forward. Last time I checked, changing the flow of time is not possible in Fallout. It's not like console developers, who have a concrete set of requirements to work with. Everyone's PC is different. So you can't hold them accountable for your game, and complain because they didn't make the graphics tailor-made to run on your computer specifically.

And if you don't like the collecting skill, no one is forcing you to do it. There are plenty of features in the game that I don't particularly enjoy. That's kind of the point. There are many options for many different styles of play. The "rpg elements" are completely optional.

Also, I am perfectly capable of making attractive sims. And there is plenty of opportunity to make characters in the game look different. I fail to see how TS2 is superior in terms of sim design. Most of the sims in the TS2 have the same face, with very similar body structures, the only real difference being hair and clothes.

[ani_]

Second, it meant the game could run on nearly any computer at the time. The simple textures used in The Sims 2 kept the system requirements low while still making it a great-looking game. And seeing as The Sims series mainly appeals to casual gamers who have no interest in high-end gaming PCs, it makes perfect sense.

It's always easy to go and say about an old game how considered the company was about their customers because they made their game so low end everybody could play it. But how well a game plays, should be compared to what the technology was back then.

There used to be a time I could not play community lots on TS1 or huge lots on TS1 because my computer would lag so much. When TS2 came out, I had to buy a new computer that was above the requirements, but still it was a barely running game. Big houses or big community lots, were out of the question. The Goth household was way too big for my computer. Even smaller community lots were a pain because of all the Sims who would show up, would slow things down. So my game was very bound to the home lot. I didn't see a Sim reflection until the end of 2008 when I got a newer computer.

Of course now, if you would go and buy a new PC, both TS2 and TS1 will run perfectly and fast. The same with TS3, 5 years from now, when people have better computers, TS3 will come an example of a smooth running game while TS4 will be lagging the newer computers.

As Theatrhythm said, laggish game is not the game's fault, but the computer's fault. Companies don't make games laggish to make us miserable, games lag because the end user's computers are not always up to par.

About Sims:
The whole uncanny thing is not something I would say fits TS3. As it's graphics are not that realistic. TS3 Sims are not as cartoony as TS2 Sims but in no way are they über realistic either.

I actually like the way TS3 Sims look. In the base game, well, Sims were not very pretty, nor very well done. But already by the second EP, Sims looked way better, sharper faces, more distinct looks and so on. In Ambition they went from pretty to original looking, some even to but ugly, and in LN some of the Sims were just stunning. The pudding factor doesn't come into play any more unless you are playing an un-modded game, then all the automatically generated Sims have the same face, a bug EA should fix, but thankfully there are mods for now.

TS2 Sims never got that huge improvement in their looks. EA used the same faces in the base-game, that it used in the last EP. Only the AL groupie people had a few lookers among them, but they were all still the same face-templates used, not much tweaking was done.

TS2 Sims, were fine, but they were never pretty. Not without changing every bit of genetics with CC. No eye-lashes, painted eyes, lifeless skin and those horrid eye-brows. I really do hope TS4 does not go back to that.

Rabbitholes. Well, I personally think they are in fact overused, but not a bad concept.
Very well said.

All games have good things and bad things in them. Criticizing a game is good, but your original post, was not criticizing, it was bashing. I actually thought you played TS2 because your post was so negative - so to learn that you actually prefer TS3 over TS2 came a bit as a shocker. There are a few other people on this forum who are like you, they play TS3 even thou every thing that comes from their mouth is a angry shouting how TS3 sucks. But for some reason they don't go back to TS2 even thou they keep painting it as the perfect Sim game.

Maybe time will do to TS3 what it did to TS2. When TS2 was the active game, the forum had more critisizing, EA suck/is lazy/doesn't care/is evil, post. Specially after new EP's and SP's because EA for example EA never remembered to update their objects to previous SP and EP functionality. Now, when you read about TS2, it's all bunnies and sunshine because there is no new content that breaks their game, there are no new bugs, all fixes have been downloaded, and what you can't fix people have learned to live with or work around.

[noxnoxnox]

well said, ani :D

[ElementMK]

See, Extensa? This is why I don't post in the Sims board. All I want to do is whine a little, and someone like Ani_ has to tear my argument to shreds. *huff*

Just one thing, though:
All games have good things and bad things in them. Criticizing a game is good, but your original post, was not criticizing, it was bashing. I actually thought you played TS2 because your post was so negative - so to learn that you actually prefer TS3 over TS2 came a bit as a shocker. There are a few other people on this forum who are like you, they play TS3 even thou every thing that comes from their mouth is a angry shouting how TS3 sucks. But for some reason they don't go back to TS2 even thou they keep painting it as the perfect Sim game.Criticizing and bashing was a thin line for me while writing. It's not like a review, where one should balance praise and criticism because people rely on your opinion for a purchase. You guys play the game; you know what the good stuff is (and the bad stuff, too). Like I said, I had a lot more "here's how we can fix this problem" later on, though I will stop falling back on "If only you had seen the rest!" as a defense. I now notice that I certainly don't seem as supportive of the game as I intend to be. Funnily enough, I was often more supportive of TS3 at MATY than I am here. Similarly, The Sims 2 was flawed in many ways, yes, but it was also the real start of the franchise. It was a huge leap over TS1, so flaws are to be expected. TS3 fixed many of these flaws (like unholy loading screens), but also brought many of its own (a shortage of original directions to take the franchise), all while not being such a climactic leap from TS2. IIRC, TS3 even hijacks animations from TS2, which is why some social interactions look a little ... off.

Also, about the computers, you seem to be missing my point while still making a very strong one yourself. My point wasn't how well each game ran compared to their respective tech. In fact, I've been in a position where both of them sucked. I am talking about how different the two games will look at their respective graphical qualities. IMO, TS3 makes much larger jumps toward muddy textures and other negatives than TS2 did.

[r_deNoube]

...Also, I think that rabbitholes absolutely suck when you are playing a single Sim or a couple, but if you play biggg families like I like to, they're quite a relief...

And I think that's a realistic simulation, too! Getting the kids off to school is supposed to reduce the panic level of the heads of the household, i.e. the players... while conversely if you have to wait at home when your older sibs / parents are off at school/work, it really seems like there's nothing to do until they get home. That is all just fine for someone like me who's interested in the story more than the game-ness of it.

It's too bad that sleep is such a rabbithole in its own right, though... Sims all do need their sleep, and that's fine, but then the town is pretty dead for a matter of hours. That used to annoy me a lot, but it has been much less of a problem since I gussied up my machine so "ultra speed" really means it. But now I have to scratch my head over why it takes all that horsepower to get through times of so little visible action...

[crocobaura]

Rabbitholes are, in many ways, the biggest complaint TS3 gamers have. It's not hard to see why. It's not interesting in the slightest to watch a building with only minimal control over what's going on inside it. Since rabbitholes represent places like restaurants, job locations, and movie theatres, you'll be staring at them for quite a bit of the game. The Sims 2 had sims disappear from the lot for jobs, but you'd think there would be a step forward for The Sims 3, not just a pretty building instead of a disappearing carpool. Imagine actually seeing and controlling your Sims as they experience hard work in a military academy, or urgent situations happening in the hospital. Each job could, in some ways, become games within themselves. I still don't know how to make the business job fun, though. Though the Ambitions expansion tries to alleviate this, it fails for reasons I'll point out in a future post.




Ambitions jobs were too scripted. I know I got tired of taking my firetruck to the same couple of houses that always had fires in the exact same spots. Anyway, maybe they should do the career jobs like the jobs in open for business. A sim would gain skills and this will allow him to opt for some career job, which in turn will allow him to have some career specific interractions either with career objects or sims. They would have to probably set up an office, or get a job at a community place (which is not a rabbit hole). So sims in the culinary career would work at a restaurant or bakery, if the restaurant had a piano in it, then it could also hire a musician, a museum could hire an artist sim either as a curator or as an art teacher or guide, the gym and community pool could hire sims in the athletic career as instructors or managers and maybe also a handyman to fix the broken equipment. And there should be limits to the sims that can fill in certain job positions, like there should be only 1 mayor in the city.

[Miko09]

TS2 Sims, were fine, but they were never pretty. Not without changing every bit of genetics with CC. No eye-lashes, painted eyes, lifeless skin and those horrid eye-brows. I really do hope TS4 does not go back to that.


That's the one argument that bugs me when TS2 players want to crap on TS3:
OMG my sims are so bootyful! Realism!!1! Sims 3 looks like pudding! :Fgl;fgjfpigjfmg!
I know the sims in Sims 3 may not be everyone taste and in the beginning there were some facial issues, but sims from Sims 2 are not pretty when you remove all that precious CC

Ambitions jobs were too scripted. I know I got tired of taking my firetruck to the same couple of houses that always had fires in the exact same spots. Anyway, maybe they should do the career jobs like the jobs in open for business. A sim would gain skills and this will allow him to opt for some career job, which in turn will allow him to have some career specific interractions either with career objects or sims. They would have to probably set up an office, or get a job at a community place (which is not a rabbit hole). So sims in the culinary career would work at a restaurant or bakery, if the restaurant had a piano in it, then it could also hire a musician, a museum could hire an artist sim either as a curator or as an art teacher or guide, the gym and community pool could hire sims in the athletic career as instructors or managers and maybe also a handyman to fix the broken equipment. And there should be limits to the sims that can fill in certain job positions, like there should be only 1 mayor in the city.

Ambitions was just messy all over the place. There were a lot of neat features added, but the RPG elements were too constraining and not random enough. Not to mention the actual variety of ambitions available. You have ambitions and dreams, eh? Too bad, you're a firefighter. Here's your helmet and the fire starts at 4pm. :wtf:

[AngelicScot]

I have Sims 1, Sims 2, and Sims 3 on my computer. They ALL run comfortably without all the settings set to High. I really don't require that they be there. There is enough detail to make me happy. My biggest moan about Sims 3 is the fact that I've never been able to play a single game without it seriously glitching somehow and having to delete it. I don't have that problem in Sims 2. Nor Sims 1 for that matter. So I play Sims 3 until I miss weather, then I play Sims 2 for a while. Feel like a bit of magic and want to turn everyone into toads? Sims 1 for a bit takes care of that particular itch.

Rabbitholes? I do one of two things. Speed up time OR wander around the 'hood and see who is doing what, where. That usually makes for some amusement. I do NOT use any mods in my game. Just not interested. Extol their virtues 'til the end of time. You're just talking to a wall as far as I'm concerned. For those of you who feel you must have them to make your games enjoyable, more power to you. I'm glad that you enjoy your games.

As far as that video you referenced goes. If the Sims 3 had looked like THAT, I'd never have bought the thing and would have ended with Sims 2. Just my preference.

Bashing EA? Well, I've been a customer of EA since 1995-ish. And back then, you put your money down and actually got a very good game. Bugs weren't an issue, gameplay was good, or you wouldn't play it more than once, and you certainly wouldn't put more money out on other EA titles. This whole franchise has been sliding downhill, EA doesn't want to invest the money it would take to pay people to put in the hours and hours it would take to make a good, stable game anymore. As for a Sims 4? I'm seriously beginning to doubt there will be one.

[ani_]

Too bad, you're a firefighter. Here's your helmet and the fire starts at 4pm. :wtf:
This made me lol :D


Ambitions was just messy all over the place. There were a lot of neat features added, but the RPG elements were too constraining and not random enough. Not to mention the actual variety of ambitions available. You have ambitions and dreams, eh?

The best thing about Ambition were the open ended careers. Inventor + the ability to register as a self-employed like nectar maker, gardener and such. The interior designer job

I do like crocobaura ideas about businesses, it would very much like OFB but somehow it should also implement the RH work aspects, like being able to get promotions and advance in the career, but if the actual lot would be owned by a Sim, it should be done in a way that doesn't bankrupt the lot owner - or the lot owner could decide on the promotion.

After the Sim gets the promotion, the Sim should at least at some point start doing other tasks in the job-lot, which then would open up a new slot for the low level job.

Maybe it could be implemented so that every work object, is one opening. Like, every stove in the restaurant is an opening for level 1 of the career. Where you could advance until you become lets say a waiter then the owner would need to buy a waiter object of some sort, then you could buy a host podium, which would open the next promotion level for host. And then the waiter position would be open for another low level employee to get a promotion.

[Laisanae]

Guys...... this is just a friggin GAME.

[Simsica]

I'm so sick and tired of people complaining so much. Really, if the game sucks so bad, why do you play it and then frequent a forum about it? If you hate the developer, then vote with your wallet and stop buying their products.

Well, that's what I did. They'll see me spend money on their products again when it snows in hell. Or when they make a good sim game. Whichever happens first.

And as to the first question: EA bought out the single life sim game on the market. It was a game that surprised the world with its unique concept and attracted millions of people who prior to that played no games. Maxis did this. Then Maxis sold out to EA, and pranced off to develop Spore. While Spore is definitely an intriguing concept, it's not a game I'd like to continue playing for indefinite amount of time like The Sims are.

And right now EA isn't doing a good job in develping a good life sim, IMHO, not to mention that it didn't do anything to truly advance the genre. But since it's still the single developer that works in this neglected genre, I personally, as well as many others out there, whine and complain *to&about them* and to anyone who'll listen. We did after all give them our money, and as disatisfied customers we have every right to speak up about it if we want to.

If you're sick and tired reading about it, then *don't read* about it. I don't care if you're sick and tired withit, just as much as you don't care for all the whining.

Unfortunately, no amount of sickness or whining is going to make a decent simulation game out of TS3. However, chances are that someone in EA will stop and think about all the whining and maybe - just maybe - make a better sim next time.

So there's a series of good reasons for the whining that goes on, even years after the game got out.

I'd like everyone that hates the whining to stop and think about that fact. Three years later, we still have a good cause to whine about the most basic of concepts that define TS3.

[Miko09]

I do like crocobaura ideas about businesses, it would very much like OFB but somehow it should also implement the RH work aspects, like being able to get promotions and advance in the career, but if the actual lot would be owned by a Sim, it should be done in a way that doesn't bankrupt the lot owner - or the lot owner could decide on the promotion.

After the Sim gets the promotion, the Sim should at least at some point start doing other tasks in the job-lot, which then would open up a new slot for the low level job.

Maybe it could be implemented so that every work object, is one opening. Like, every stove in the restaurant is an opening for level 1 of the career. Where you could advance until you become lets say a waiter then the owner would need to buy a waiter object of some sort, then you could buy a host podium, which would open the next promotion level for host. And then the waiter position would be open for another low level employee to get a promotion.

This setup remind me of how jobs were set up in that Urbz games. I could see it being somewhat mod possible, with sims earning money for doing "tasks" like cooking on a community lot, etc.

Guys...... this is just a friggin GAME.

:giggler: :giggler: I wouldnt expect someone with a 178 post count to understand :giggler:

I kidd I kidd. For a game geared towards the casual audience, the Sims does have a large set of passionate players. One example is the TS2 vs TS3 ongoing war. It's like the West Side Story except no one can dance.

[calisims]

I think one problem with the open career rabbitholes is that with RHs like the restaurant and theater, you want them to be open and available for your Sim to patronize for most hours of the day. If actual Sims, either your own or the neighbors, had to actually staff those venues, they would be working all day. Or, the game would have to be set up so there were enough workers to cover multiple shifts, so that when your restaurant worker Sim isn't working, the restaurant is still open. I'm not saying that it's impossible, it's just complicated, and would require a lot of Sims in the neighborhood to cover multiple shifts in the bistro, diner, stadium and theater.

[JackJess]

*WARNING! This following chunk of text is a rant. BEWARE!*
FFF! And your'e moaning about trees being absolute **** on low quality? You should see sims! Sims look like clowns! And I had to stand that for 2 years until I got a new laptop!
SO PLEASE, JUST ENJOY THE GAME FRIENDS.

[Simsica]

What's this with "casual" games? Are there any other types of games? I don't think there's anything casual about simulations.

[JackJess]

What's this with "casual" games? Are there any other types of games? I don't think there's anything casual about simulations.
So, you don't think taking a shower for a few minutes is casual? Why? How do you take your shower? Tell us.

[Miko09]

I think one problem with the open career rabbitholes is that with RHs like the restaurant and theater, you want them to be open and available for your Sim to patronize for most hours of the day. If actual Sims, either your own or the neighbors, had to actually staff those venues, they would be working all day. Or, the game would have to be set up so there were enough workers to cover multiple shifts, so that when your restaurant worker Sim isn't working, the restaurant is still open. I'm not saying that it's impossible, it's just complicated, and would require a lot of Sims in the neighborhood to cover multiple shifts in the bistro, diner, stadium and theater.

Well in real life, unless it's a 24 hour establishment, stores aren't open all day. It shouldn't be too hard to pull a npc/townie/sim to a lot, have them work as cashier, cook, barista, mixologist, etc for a couple of hours, and then send them home, with a new sim coming in after them. If you wanted to be safe, you could even have the previous sim stay at the register until the next sim makes it into work while getting overtime. The game already sort of does that with the cosignment shop and the in game registers(although at weird intervals). Plus in Sims 2, we had a sign that would signal whether or not the shop was open or closed so EA could just bring that back. I dont believe we would need a lot of sims to work shifts either as sims work almost everyday anyway. I think there should a shift assigner or a feature similar to it that would let you choose which days you want employees to come in, IF WE EVER GET A BUSINESS EP(I'm talking to you, EA spy :report:)

[calisims]

In the consignment shop, you have one NPC who works 7 days a week, 9 - 5 (or 6?). The mixologists also work 7 days a week for the entire time the bar is open. If you were to open every RH job and use NPCs to staff them, then what would the neighbors do for jobs? And if you are using neighbors to staff all positions in every opened RH job, then you'd need multiple shifts to cover all the hours that the RHs are open. In the case of the bistro, your culinary career Sim works evening hours. So, unless you want the bistro closed for lunch, you'd need neighborhood Sims to work the early shift, and to work the days your Sim has off, as well as neighborhood Sims to work alongside your Sim. And it would have to do the same for the grocery store, the diner, the theater, the stadium, etc. That's a lot of Sims.

When people talk about opening RH jobs, they tend to think of it from the one Sim point of view, much like the OFB businesses. But TS3 is an open neighborhood, you can't just pull workers out of thin air, and the business must run even when your Sim isn't working, and even when your Sim is not involved with that business.
You also want neighbors to be available to interact with socially, so making them work extremely hours would be a pain. It's not possible to have relationships with the WA cash register jockeys, they never leave their posts. Mixologists are also difficult, though they do have off hours, they work 7 days a week for most of the day.

[Laisanae]

:giggler: :giggler: I wouldnt expect someone with a 178 post count to understand :giggler:

I kidd I kidd. For a game geared towards the casual audience, the Sims does have a large set of passionate players. One example is the TS2 vs TS3 ongoing war. It's like the West Side Story except no one can dance.

Pff, it's not the amount of posts that makes a simmer A Real simmer. :P It's the passion! And also the correct behavior towards other simmers. Play sims, not war!

[Miko09]

In the consignment shop, you have one NPC who works 7 days a week, 9 - 5 (or 6?). The mixologists also work 7 days a week for the entire time the bar is open. If you were to open every RH job and use NPCs to staff them, then what would the neighbors do for jobs? And if you are using neighbors to staff all positions in every opened RH job, then you'd need multiple shifts to cover all the hours that the RHs are open. In the case of the bistro, your culinary career Sim works evening hours. So, unless you want the bistro closed for lunch, you'd need neighborhood Sims to work the early shift, and to work the days your Sim has off, as well as neighborhood Sims to work alongside your Sim. And it would have to do the same for the grocery store, the diner, the theater, the stadium, etc. That's a lot of Sims.

When people talk about opening RH jobs, they tend to think of it from the one Sim point of view, much like the OFB businesses. But TS3 is an open neighborhood, you can't just pull workers out of thin air, and the business must run even when your Sim isn't working, and even when your Sim is not involved with that business.
You also want neighbors to be available to interact with socially, so making them work extremely hours would be a pain. It's not possible to have relationships with the WA cash register jockeys, they never leave their posts. Mixologists are also difficult, though they do have off hours, they work 7 days a week for most of the day.

Well my interpretation of it is that the neighbors are kind of considered NPCs(townies I think is the correct term), only because when playing with my active sim, I have no control over their actions. I classify a family/sim in the neighborhood(not homeless) that I have not made active or played as a NPC/townie. We should be able to assign those folks jobs in town, right? I'm not an advocate for opening ALL rabbitholes, but restaurants, spas, grocery stores, etc can be a little more active.

That bit about having a relationship with registers jockeys is partially false. One of my sim's girlfriends works at a food register in a bar in the town. If she was to get married to the girl and become active, THEN the cashier would lose her job. There is a way around that though but she would lose her selectability

[smorbie1]

[QUOTE=Flaygor]Well, I certainly didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition! :jest:

NO ONE expects the Spanish Inquisition (with apologies to Monty Python). :rofl:

[MarylenaSTAR]

I dont like sims 3. Their faces are really pudding like and the animations are bad. The clothes aren't exactly that nice, PLUS nearly all the buildings are rabbithole buildings. You also cannot create towns, only edit the origonal ones

I find that they thought sims 3 was better because they dont have loading screens but i liked the loading screens, especially the family photos ;)
I love sims 2 and always will do.

Peace out

[mithrak_nl]

The only thing I can really rant about in the Sims 3, is the routing issues. The way sims move to the other side of the lot just to chat or cancel their action because some other sim is in their way, while there are alternative routes available. Atm I even tend to cheat with motives when sims get up in the morning and only have an hour before work :/ Just going to the kitchen already eats up 15-30mins if they happen to bump into a different sim at the stairs.

But as for the OP's complaint about the rabbitholes. I hoped that Ambitions would give us more features like Open for Business from Sims 2. This would create a nice compromise between rabbitholes and fully controllable workspaces. I dont understand why we dont have the ability to start a business yet like in OFB. I wouldnt like to lose the rabbitholes in any case. When juggling a larger family, I sometimes like the rabbitholes. If I would have to switch between too many open lots all the time, even my new pc would have a tough time :p

[van Dorn]

See, Extensa? This is why I don't post in the Sims board. All I want to do is whine a little, and someone like Ani_ has to tear my argument to shreds. *huff*


So you are upset because Ani is more logical and picked apart your argument? These boards are not for whining, but discussion.

[TheLB]

See, Extensa? This is why I don't post in the Sims board. All I want to do is whine a little, and someone like Ani_ has to tear my argument to shreds. *huff*. Were you honestly expecting to blow anyone's mind by presenting the same tired complaints in paragraph form?

It's always easy to go and say about an old game how considered the company was about their customers because they made their game so low end everybody could play it. But how well a game plays, should be compared to what the technology was back then.

Of course now, if you would go and buy a new PC, both TS2 and TS1 will run perfectly and fast. The same with TS3, 5 years from now, when people have better computers, TS3 will come an example of a smooth running game while TS4 will be lagging the newer computers.

Thank you for having some sense. It's like complaining that TS3 doesn't run as smoothly as Rollercoaster Tycoon.

[calisims]

Well my interpretation of it is that the neighbors are kind of considered NPCs(townies I think is the correct term), only because when playing with my active sim, I have no control over their actions. I classify a family/sim in the neighborhood(not homeless) that I have not made active or played as a NPC/townie. We should be able to assign those folks jobs in town, right? I'm not an advocate for opening ALL rabbitholes, but restaurants, spas, grocery stores, etc can be a little more active.


Yeah, the NPC term in Sims can get confusing. I was using 'NPC' to refer to the service Sim types who disappear into the ether or into a blacked out apartment in LN when they aren't working, and 'neighbor' as Sims who live in town and can be visited.
Those Sims do have jobs, but my point is, if all the RHs that provide a service, like the spa, restaurants, etc, were opened up rather than RHs, then there would have to be staff working there during all hours of operation, whether your Sim was employed there or not.
Then you would either have Sims working insanely long hours, and thus be less available for socializing, or you would have to have multiple Sims covering different shifts. To fill all those spots for all those RHs, and to still have Sims working in the other careers would require lots of Sims.

I would love to know how your Sim has a girlfriend that works a cash register. Mine never ever leave their jobs. If I call them and ask them out, they are 'busy' and can't come.

[Miko09]

Yeah, the NPC term in Sims can get confusing. I was using 'NPC' to refer to the service Sim types who disappear into the ether or into a blacked out apartment in LN when they aren't working, and 'neighbor' as Sims who live in town and can be visited.
Those Sims do have jobs, but my point is, if all the RHs that provide a service, like the spa, restaurants, etc, were opened up rather than RHs, then there would have to be staff working there during all hours of operation, whether your Sim was employed there or not.
Then you would either have Sims working insanely long hours, and thus be less available for socializing, or you would have to have multiple Sims covering different shifts. To fill all those spots for all those RHs, and to still have Sims working in the other careers would require lots of Sims.

I would love to know how your Sim has a girlfriend that works a cash register. Mine never ever leave their jobs. If I call them and ask them out, they are 'busy' and can't come.

Maybe there should be a distinction between relying on whether or not the lot is player owned. If it's not, then service NPCs can man the different stations. If the player built the lot, steps should be made so that the NPC has a bathroom to pee, a chance to eat, etc. If it is player owned, then it's up to the player to find employees shifts that do tire them out or over work them. The rabbithole jobs are really just there to make money. I dont think they have any effect on the town or the town's economics so you really dont have to have a lot of sims in those careers nor should you have to fill all of the spots if rabbitholes were open. It should be purely optional what shops and businesses you would like to be open.

I will have to come back later to update with pics of my sim's girlfriend working

[calisims]

LOL, I don't need pics of your Sim's girlfriend working. I want to know how you get her to stop working to go on a date.

I know you don't need a lot of Sims to work the RH jobs, but I wouldn't want my town to be filled with just service Sims working in the restaurants and spas, either. So even if I don't have a Sim working in business or journalism, I like having some Sims in my town employed in those careers. I don't want everyone in town being placed in the service jobs.
While using service NPCs to man the jobs in non-player businesses could work, you are adding a ton more NPCs to the pool. I know I'm not the only person who deletes the bouncer ropes in my clubs and bars just to eliminate the need for more useless NPCs.

[HarVee]

Is there really a point in complaining about the fact you dislike TS3? Don't like TS3? Go play TS2 instead and stop moaning about TS3.

Common Sense has spoken.

[Miko09]

LOL, I don't need pics of your Sim's girlfriend working. I want to know how you get her to stop working to go on a date.

I know you don't need a lot of Sims to work the RH jobs, but I wouldn't want my town to be filled with just service Sims working in the restaurants and spas, either. So even if I don't have a Sim working in business or journalism, I like having some Sims in my town employed in those careers. I don't want everyone in town being placed in the service jobs.
While using service NPCs to man the jobs in non-player businesses could work, you are adding a ton more NPCs to the pool. I know I'm not the only person who deletes the bouncer ropes in my clubs and bars just to eliminate the need for more useless NPCs.

LOL I was typing too fast and that last sentence didn't register all the way. I dont know what pictures would have even proved. I dont think I've ever taken her out on a date, but I have invited her over several times. I always assumed the register was closed when she is not there. Most of the time I visit her at work. I think the catch is that she is not a service NPC. I believe she lives in town like any of sim. I'm starting to think this is possible due to Twallan's Register mod. Allows you to assign sims to registers around town through different criteria.

[calisims]

My Sim family lives across the street from the bookstore (non-rabbit hole, with WA register) and it has the same cashier working 24/7. Until he/she dies and is replaced. But yeah, it's always a service type. I have Register mod, but I haven't bothered assigning any of my neighbors to the registers.
It's been a long time since I tried have a relationship with one, because they'd never come over when called, they were always working. But they were always the service NPCs, not townies.

[crocobaura]

LOL I was typing too fast and that last sentence didn't register all the way. I dont know what pictures would have even proved. I dont think I've ever taken her out on a date, but I have invited her over several times. I always assumed the register was closed when she is not there. Most of the time I visit her at work. I think the catch is that she is not a service NPC. I believe she lives in town like any of sim. I'm starting to think this is possible due to Twallan's Register mod. Allows you to assign sims to registers around town through different criteria.


Actually, the game seems to assign the sims on a first come in town basis. I made some worlds long ago and one of them included some store registers. I was kind of expecting the game to spawn and assign sims but it didn't. I had to create them, put them in houses and then the game assigned them to the empty registers. I remember there was this sim lady that would come and go daily to work and was playable in between.

[jenieusa]

Second, it meant the game could run on nearly any computer at the time.

Wrong--O

this required me to go purchase a new PC.....i'm afraid my Sims 1 computer
said HELL NO!

and yep with Sims 3...i needed yet another new PC...and

i expect the tradition to continue!!

[ElementMK]

Unfortunately, no amount of sickness or whining is going to make a decent simulation game out of TS3. However, chances are that someone in EA will stop and think about all the whining and maybe - just maybe - make a better sim next time.There's also the chance that another developer could take a shot at it. The Sims audience is massive, so a good competing game could be very valuable.

So you are upset because Ani is more logical and picked apart your argument? These boards are not for whining, but discussion.Er, no. I've stated repeatedly that I would like people to pick apart my argument. I was simply joking about how well Ani did it.

Were you honestly expecting to blow anyone's mind by presenting the same tired complaints in paragraph form?No. I was saving that experience for this very moment.
http://i55.tinypic.com/j16cg7.jpg

[fraroc]

I don't think that people hate TS3 as much as they feel that EA has wronged them and all of the fans.

[crocobaura]

This made me lol :D

The best thing about Ambition were the open ended careers. Inventor + the ability to register as a self-employed like nectar maker, gardener and such. The interior designer job

I do like crocobaura ideas about businesses, it would very much like OFB but somehow it should also implement the RH work aspects, like being able to get promotions and advance in the career, but if the actual lot would be owned by a Sim, it should be done in a way that doesn't bankrupt the lot owner - or the lot owner could decide on the promotion.

After the Sim gets the promotion, the Sim should at least at some point start doing other tasks in the job-lot, which then would open up a new slot for the low level job.

Maybe it could be implemented so that every work object, is one opening. Like, every stove in the restaurant is an opening for level 1 of the career. Where you could advance until you become lets say a waiter then the owner would need to buy a waiter object of some sort, then you could buy a host podium, which would open the next promotion level for host. And then the waiter position would be open for another low level employee to get a promotion.


I'm thinking the career objects, should be skill objects. Once a sim reaches maximum skill, he could be promoted. Depending on the job, it could be either unlocking another career skill object or being able to hold a different job. So, if we have a sim in the medical career, it could have different levels, like nurse or resident physician and they would have to work with another higher level doctor. Once they promote, they would be able to have their own practice as GP and would probably have to hire a nurse too. If they are really good at that then they could become surgeons and get a surgery theater. And they could become world reknown surgeons if they performed 100 successful sugeries. You could hire a sim in the business career to manage your hospital if you have like 2 surgeons and 2 nurses working with you. Same for culinary, sims could advance from dishwasher to waiter, or maybe to cook. The cook could then advance to become master cook and make pizza, or pastries, or chocolates, or french food, or baker. He would get a pizza/bread oven, or a pastry/chocolates display shelf. This way you could choose what kind of businesses are in your town and advance them only as far as you want them to. I hardly ever played careers in the sims, and in TS2 I had quite a lot of community businesses that used largely the business objects that came with the game. I knew and played every one of those sims and as long as there are set business hours I don't think you need to have too many sims assigned to one business alone, especially if it's not a very large business. And if you think about it there are already about 200 or more sims living already in a neigbourhood, they may as well perform some useful jobs instead of just populating the town. If you think about it, any sim with high enough handiness or cleaning skills could be registered with the Sim Yellow Pages and you could call anyone of them to repair or clean your house, you don't need a random NPC for that.

[Lenne224]

I really don't understand the open work thing, I like the rabbitholes, and rarely have a sim in a ambition carreer. If I liked to micro manage a proffession/job, I would play a tycoon game, for example Hospital tycoon.

[crocobaura]

I really don't understand the open work thing, I like the rabbitholes, and rarely have a sim in a ambition carreer. If I liked to micro manage a proffession/job, I would play a tycoon game, for example Hospital tycoon.

Some people like to micromanage jobs. OFB businesses in TS2 were quite popular with simmers. On the other hand, the main advantage over rabbit holes is that you can fully use them with other sims without actually micromanaging them. Take your sim to a restaurant and there is a maitre'd and a waiter who sometimes spills food on you, if you go to a coffee shop then there is a barista to serve you with coffee, if you go for a massage there is a massage bed and a chiropractor to give you a massage. Personally, I think it's much nicer than looking at a rabbit hole building.

Also, people might be more tempted to micromanage and advance businesses if every new level unlocked new objects or interractions that would in turn benefit the whole neighbourhood. Think of the mixologist job, in the beginning you can make just two types of drinks, as the sim gets better at it, there's more drinks options, so if you own a bar it would be very popular if you have a skilled mixologist serving drinks and maybe a popular band performing. If the mixologist is bad then there would be few customers and bad moodlets or something.

[Magorienx]

I happen to disagree entirely with your rant. As someone who played a great deal of the The Sims 2 and, indeed, the first Sims game, I believe that The Sims 3 is the best of game in the series. I use the word game very deliberately because The Sims 3 seems to be the a very deliberate attempt to create a game and not simply a simulation/interior-design-tool/storytelling-medium/game that the other two attempted to be. Often times in the previous games gameplay was sacrificed to bolster the aspects.

In order to continue this discussion we must first define what we mean by game and gameplay. A game, by my definition is a set of rules which are used to create goals. Gameplay is the actions taken by a player to complete those goals. This differentiates a game from a "sandbox" in which there are a set of rules but all goals are created by the players. A simulation is similar to the aforementioned sandbox except that in a simulation the rules are created in order to approximate reality.

Lets look at gameplay as it relates to a game most people have played: SimCity. SimCity is important in the history of video games because it was one of the first products in introduce "emergent" gameplay. When SimCity first came out many did not consider it a game because it did not have "win" and "lose" conditions. This is because most games at that point had 1-2 goals. Either you should try to win (as in say, Super Mario Bros.) or try not to loose (as in Space Invaders). Although SimCity did not have simple win/loss goals, it did have goals that emerged from playing the game. For instance when I build houses in SimCity they require water and power. So my goal is then to build a power station. I find myself in debt so I must build some commercial to raise revenue. Due to the large number of needs that need to be fulfilled, the city grows. Even though there is no overarching goal to grow the city, it grows by fulfilling each individual goal that is presented.

The first sims game attempted to implement a similar concept with moderate success. This was implemented through the the needs system (or "rule" to go back to our earlier definition of game). For instance, I need to fill my hunger so I buy a refrigeration and I have an energy need so I buy a bed. All these things require money so I get a job. This may look, at first glance, like the SimCity example above, however there are two large problems with emergent gameplay in the Sims as it relates to its implementation in practice. The first is that, once I have all the mood boosting items, I have no need keep my job and increase my career level. This is because the rules (fulfill your needs) is divorced from the rules (fulfill your needs). Sure, we as players, will chase these goals and even have a lot of fun doing so, but there is no compelling reason within the rules or presented goals of the game to pursue this path. The same can be said for almost everything else that makes the sims the sims. There is no need besides personal edification to expand our house, fall in love with other sims, or experience all of the other content that the many ts1 expansion packs offered.

These goals are, therefore, player created and not emergent from the game rules. This means that TS1 was essentially two products built into one. It was a limited game connected loosely to a large and ever growing sandbox. So most people, me included, viewed it as a sandbox. I'll admit that I spent so much more time creating sims and building houses than I did playing the game. When I did actually jump into live mode, I opted for sandbox style play and used mods to ignore the actual game. I would constantly max my moods so that I could experiment with magic, raise children, or level my career. This was fun for a while, but was less satisfying than it could have been.

The Sims 2 was a radical departure from the what TS1 was. The aspiration system brought the treadmill of wants to the game. Wants are, obviously, goals. The largest piece of the sims UI was not the moods panel, but the wants panel. Wants pushed the player to perform all the tasks that fell under "sand box" in the previous game. Wants also snowballed into one another. If I fulfill a want to flirt with a sim, then I want to kiss them and fall in love, which will roll a want for marriage which prompts a want to have a child, etc. The want oriented gameplay as opposed to the need oriented gameplay made The Sims 2 far more compelling. The game pushed the player to experience all the various features that the developers had created and made it a more satisfying and well-rounded experience. In a sense, The Sims 2 used explicit goals to achieve a SimCity style of growth.

There was one HUGE problem with the Sims 2. Players were primarily motive to fulfill their sim's wants, but they still had to worry about their sim's needs. Needs, essentially, became an annoyance. Again a dichotomy of games was created. The player had to juggle their needs in order to fulfill their wants. One had to stop pursuing the goals of the game in order to satiate needs. In essence needs were just a road block and not a compelling piece of gameplay. EA seemed to realize this and created numerous ways to simply ignore needs altogether. Dates, snapdragons, and the energizer-- every expansion added a way to ignore what should have been a core system.

The Sims 3 fixed this problem to a certain extent as well as adding some important diversity to gameplay. TS3 helped resolve the moods/wants problem via moodlets. Fulfilling needs gives the sim important advantages at work, during skilling and in social situations. Moodlets also added a resource management aspect to the game. For instance, I can "work hard" and sacrifice the fun I've saved up (in order to fulfill a wish, of course). It forces players to make trade-offs which is a rather compelling gameplay decision. For instance, I can stay up late to get another skill or I can go to bed early and get the "well rested" moodlet. Which is more useful? It depends on the situation.

The Sims 3 also has a greater depth in gameplay. Some of the skill journal challenges (particularly the gardening and collecting ones) are much more involved and diverse than any want in TS2. TS3 also adds further reasons to do something besides just the explicit goals presented as promises. For instance I might do X to receive a moodlet in order to complete a wish. This removes the action one degree from wish/promise system. This helps make the game a little less myopic. Opportunities function in a similar manner.

Now, I realize this post has gone on for quite a while without addressing any specific point in the OP's post. So lets get to that.

The graphics in TS3 are, indeed better than TS2 but not significantly so. That is a valid criticism. However, there are certain trade-offs that must be made. TS3 renders a huge open world with no loading screens instead of the single household in TS2. My PC, which runs some of the most system intensive PC games without a hiccup still struggles to run TS3 at full spec. As to specific criticisms of the aesthetics, I happen to disagree sharply. If the goal of the designers was to create a life simulation, realism in sim design would be paramount. TS3 is a game which uses highly skewed approximations of real life as a backdrop to a game. It therefore, does not concern me that sims look cartoony as long as a pleasing aesthetic is consistently kept throughout the game. TS3 adds complexity to the aesthetic but does not make it look anything close to "realistic". The faces are not as detailed as L.A. Noire or even GTA. The same goes for any of the effects that are added (like water). I'm, therefore, not sure where you're coming from on the graphics issue.

As for rabbit holes, they are, from a gameplay perspective no different from the community lots in TS2. They are a means to achieve a want/wish. The only difference is that it took two clicks instead of 1 to eat at the cafe. I guess I could also watch my sim perform the same eating animation over and over. Nothing compelling went on at these areas that couldn't have gone on outside of them. When I went grocery shopping in TS2 I went to the lot and clicked on an object to bring up a menu. In TS3 I click on the lot to bring up a menu. From a gameplay perspective there is no change. As to the fallout example, they are equivalent. The vast majority of interiors(excluding dungeons) in Fallout 3 are superfluous. Nothing occurs inside them. They are simply closets that hold NPC's. To you they may add completeness to the world, but they could be cut out entirely and most people wouldn't notice because the core of fallout gameplay does not revolve around walking into a copy-pasted house with a bed and several containers.

Usable interior spaces add to the "realism" of a game and may improve some people's experience with a product but it does not fudementally effect "gamepaly" as you claim. That would be like claiming that because I can't see people walking around on the sidewalks in SimCity that it is somehow a worse game. It may hurt the simulation aspect of it, but it does not effect the core systems that a game designer creates.

Just my 2c on the complaints in this thread and others about TS3.

[calisims]

I hardly ever played careers in the sims, and in TS2 I had quite a lot of community businesses that used largely the business objects that came with the game. I knew and played every one of those sims and as long as there are set business hours I don't think you need to have too many sims assigned to one business alone, especially if it's not a very large business. And if you think about it there are already about 200 or more sims living already in a neigbourhood, they may as well perform some useful jobs instead of just populating the town. If you think about it, any sim with high enough handiness or cleaning skills could be registered with the Sim Yellow Pages and you could call anyone of them to repair or clean your house, you don't need a random NPC for that.

I used to do that in Sims 2 as well, I had a whole neighborhood where I never used any careers, everyone either owned a business or worked at an owned business.
But the difference between TS2 and TS3 is, in TS2, if I sent a Sim to visit a business at whatever time I wanted, that business would be open and its staff available to serve me.
If I were playing the owner, I could keep my staff there for 12 hours or more if I wanted. But when playing those workers, they would go to work for a set 9 to 5 shift, no matter what hours their boss normally made them work. And when they went to work, they did the disappearing thing, not going to the venue for you to play them being a cashier, etc.
In TS3, the businesses need to be open during their hours of operation, available to Sims to patronize. If your restaurant owner decides to close their bistro on the weekend, then your other Sims can't go to the bistro on the weekend. If your bistro owner wants to operate the restaurant for normal hours (lunch through late evening, 7 days a week) then you have to hire staff to cover all those hours.

[crocobaura]

I used to do that in Sims 2 as well, I had a whole neighborhood where I never used any careers, everyone either owned a business or worked at an owned business.
But the difference between TS2 and TS3 is, in TS2, if I sent a Sim to visit a business at whatever time I wanted, that business would be open and its staff available to serve me.
If I were playing the owner, I could keep my staff there for 12 hours or more if I wanted. But when playing those workers, they would go to work for a set 9 to 5 shift, no matter what hours their boss normally made them work. And when they went to work, they did the disappearing thing, not going to the venue for you to play them being a cashier, etc.
In TS3, the businesses need to be open during their hours of operation, available to Sims to patronize. If your restaurant owner decides to close their bistro on the weekend, then your other Sims can't go to the bistro on the weekend. If your bistro owner wants to operate the restaurant for normal hours (lunch through late evening, 7 days a week) then you have to hire staff to cover all those hours.

I don't see why business hours would be a problem. It's like in TS3 when I want to send my sim to watch a movie but he cannot do so at the exact moment I want it to happen because there is a concert going on at the theatre at the time and movies will start much later. Moreover, most businesses don't need to be open at all times, nor do they need lots of workers on each shift, nor should you need to have each and every possible job possition filled in and certain tasks could be done by more than one sim. However, if you have a fully developed business it could contribute significantly to your success as a business sim.
Also, maybe for certain needs like food, there could still be the NPC delivery services for groceries, or pizza, so you don't have starving sims on week-ends if all shops are closed and they have no food in their fridges.




The Sims 3 fixed this problem to a certain extent as well as adding some important diversity to gameplay. TS3 helped resolve the moods/wants problem via moodlets. Fulfilling needs gives the sim important advantages at work, during skilling and in social situations. Moodlets also added a resource management aspect to the game. For instance, I can "work hard" and sacrifice the fun I've saved up (in order to fulfill a wish, of course). It forces players to make trade-offs which is a rather compelling gameplay decision. For instance, I can stay up late to get another skill or I can go to bed early and get the "well rested" moodlet. Which is more useful? It depends on the situation.



You can ignore the moodlets quite successfully. They serve no other purpose than to give you more detailed feedback about the sim's environment than the need bars like sleep, energy, food or fun do. Who cares if the room is dark and that the walls are not painted, my sim gets the same well rested moodlet if his energy bar is full, regardless if he slept in a cheap bed in an unfinished room or an expensive bed in a fully decorated room.

[WoohooAndTheCity]

In TS3, the businesses need to be open during their hours of operation, available to Sims to patronize. If your restaurant owner decides to close their bistro on the weekend, then your other Sims can't go to the bistro on the weekend. If your bistro owner wants to operate the restaurant for normal hours (lunch through late evening, 7 days a week) then you have to hire staff to cover all those hours.

Isn't that the point?

It makes sense for some places to not be open at all hours every day of the week. If a sim can't afford a full staff, it's normal to expect the business to suffer.

What's lacking in TS3 is cause and effect. Now that there's an open neighborhood, shouldn't the actions of one sim have an effect on the rest of the town instead of things happening for no apparent reason?

[Lenne224]

Some people like to micromanage jobs. OFB businesses in TS2 were quite popular with simmers. On the other hand, the main advantage over rabbit holes is that you can fully use them with other sims without actually micromanaging them. Take your sim to a restaurant and there is a maitre'd and a waiter who sometimes spills food on you, if you go to a coffee shop then there is a barista to serve you with coffee, if you go for a massage there is a massage bed and a chiropractor to give you a massage. Personally, I think it's much nicer than looking at a rabbit hole building.

Also, people might be more tempted to micromanage and advance businesses if every new level unlocked new objects or interractions that would in turn benefit the whole neighbourhood. Think of the mixologist job, in the beginning you can make just two types of drinks, as the sim gets better at it, there's more drinks options, so if you own a bar it would be very popular if you have a skilled mixologist serving drinks and maybe a popular band performing. If the mixologist is bad then there would be few customers and bad moodlets or something.

Well I do understand the appeal of having a open spa, resturant, shops, coffie shops and stuff like that. But im thinking more in the line of jobs here not fun things to do, and some jobs are not cut out to be open. Like hospital, military ( that would have to be a rabbit hole no matter what unless we got a travel to space ep)
Sports is also a job that is better suited as a rabbit hole as well I could just as well have played fotball manager. And its not even sure we gett the right amount of team mates to have a match, and also who would the opposite team be?
Movie career well both would require a "the movies" sort of game play
Rockstar would work fine but we have band now so its kinda the same :p
(correct me if im wong here, but dont the international super spy do some out of rabbithole stuff?) Some of those things would even make the game more laggy.
Im to lazy to list up more proffession, but I hope I made myself undersandable.
I love the rabbitholes for work, I was not in all thinking fun stuff, I would not mind having a open spa for example.

And I think EA has done a good try on making jobs for all off us players, there are rabbitholes for those that like that, and there are the ambitions careers for those that like open mircor managing jobs ( pluss the ones from LN and Generations)
Im not saying sims 3 is perfect, but its a fun game and I enjoy the game for what it is.

[calisims]

Isn't that the point?

It makes sense for some places to not be open at all hours every day of the week. If a sim can't afford a full staff, it's normal to expect the business to suffer.

What's lacking in TS3 is cause and effect. Now that there's an open neighborhood, shouldn't the actions of one sim have an effect on the rest of the town instead of things happening for no apparent reason?

But it does make sense for a restaurant to be open from lunch through late evening 7 days a week.
I don't care as much about the business suffering as I care about not having a restaurant open at normal hours for my Sims who aren't in the restaurant business. And while cause and effect sounds nice, if it means that I have to work a family restaurant up to operating capacity (and maintain through generations, since the Sims now age and die when you aren't playing them) just to have a restaurant in my town, then no, I'd rather have restaurants happen for no reason.

[WoohooAndTheCity]

But it does make sense for a restaurant to be open from lunch through late evening 7 days a week.
I don't care as much about the business suffering as I care about not having a restaurant open at normal hours for my Sims who aren't in the restaurant business. And while cause and effect sounds nice, if it means that I have to work a family restaurant up to operating capacity (and maintain through generations, since the Sims now age and die when you aren't playing them) just to have a restaurant in my town, then no, I'd rather have restaurants happen for no reason.

And to keep a restaurant open at those times 7 days a week you'll need a sim that can afford a full staff. It's the same as not being able to furnish your sim's house if they lack sufficient funds. Cause and effect.

No money, no honey.

Micromanaging will only be an issue if the AI sucks. My solution? Make the AI not suck.

[calisims]

It's not just about having a Sim to afford the full staff, it's having the Sims available in town to staff all these businesses, while still allowing these sims enough time off to actually have a life.
It's not the same as not being able to afford furniture, because one Sim's lack of furniture isn't affecting the whole town.
You are basically going on the premise of playing every family in town, so that to have any businesses that function, you would have to play a family that runs the business.
While TS3 allows you to play multiple families, it's designed for playing one family while the rest of the town is moved by story progression. I know some people don't like that and would prefer to play TS2 style, but I don't see EA making such a core change to their game. I personally prefer playing one family legacy style, so I'd prefer having businesses available to my Sims to use without my having to manage those businesses personally.

[Alliteration]

When it comes to graphics, I'd rather not have high-end graphics over graphics that are nice and also run well on my computer. Very few Sims players are the kind that identify themselves as 'hardcore gamers', and very few Sims players have high end computers.

I don't know, I always figured that lots of the people who claimed to hate TS3 when it first came out were just used to TS2 and didn't like the change. The same might go for now, but for less people.

[Miko09]

It's not just about having a Sim to afford the full staff, it's having the Sims available in town to staff all these businesses, while still allowing these sims enough time off to actually have a life.
It's not the same as not being able to afford furniture, because one Sim's lack of furniture isn't affecting the whole town.
You are basically going on the premise of playing every family in town, so that to have any businesses that function, you would have to play a family that runs the business.
While TS3 allows you to play multiple families, it's designed for playing one family while the rest of the town is moved by story progression. I know some people don't like that and would prefer to play TS2 style, but I don't see EA making such a core change to their game. I personally prefer playing one family legacy style, so I'd prefer having businesses available to my Sims to use without my having to manage those businesses personally.

I dont understand why you would need to play every family in town. You may have to play a family in the beginning to set up shop but you if dont want to play them again, you shouldn't have to. Just like Story Progression takes care of sims when you're not playing, the same should be with businesses not owned by the active family. Story progression already pushes sims to register positions in town so I dont see how it would be vastly different. It's not about getting rid of the rabbitholes or replacing them with a new system, it's about complimenting the system.

But in the end, it's a feature you can totally ignore. You dont want to deal with the hassle of businesses? Then dont put any in your neighborhood.

[crocobaura]

Well I do understand the appeal of having a open spa, resturant, shops, coffie shops and stuff like that. But im thinking more in the line of jobs here not fun things to do, and some jobs are not cut out to be open. Like hospital, military ( that would have to be a rabbit hole no matter what unless we got a travel to space ep)
Sports is also a job that is better suited as a rabbit hole as well I could just as well have played fotball manager. And its not even sure we gett the right amount of team mates to have a match, and also who would the opposite team be?
Movie career well both would require a "the movies" sort of game play
Rockstar would work fine but we have band now so its kinda the same :p
(correct me if im wong here, but dont the international super spy do some out of rabbithole stuff?) Some of those things would even make the game more laggy.
Im to lazy to list up more proffession, but I hope I made myself undersandable.
I love the rabbitholes for work, I was not in all thinking fun stuff, I would not mind having a open spa for example.

And I think EA has done a good try on making jobs for all off us players, there are rabbitholes for those that like that, and there are the ambitions careers for those that like open mircor managing jobs ( pluss the ones from LN and Generations)
Im not saying sims 3 is perfect, but its a fun game and I enjoy the game for what it is.

Well, there is already a shuttle in TS3, they might as well make it go up in space every now and then for maybe a sim week. It shouldn't be very often and maybe there could be a risk of the sim never returning. For sports, instead of non-descript matches at the stadium, we could have things like swimming and diving competitions in the swimming pool, maybe even water polo. In TS2 we had the skating rinks, if they bring them back we could have figure skating, speed skating, ice hockey. We could have boxing matches and wrestling. Martial arts could be considered a sports career. We could have aerobics competitions and aerobics instructors. Swimming instructors. For team sports they don't have to reflect RL number of players or rules, There could be just 2-3 players for each team. We could have sim football and basketball! Golf could return too. Sims or teams could become more famous depending on the number of matches they won. For the movies career, we already have the movie set and props, they should enable sims to use them. They did in in TS1 so it shouldn't be too hard to do this again, I think.

[TheLB]

Last time I checked, graphics don't make the game. I'd be happier with sub-par graphics that I can run the game smoothly on, rather than graphics that will blow my mind, but will require me sinking 3000$ into an entirely new rig.

World of Warcraft has comic book-ish, cartoony graphics that are getting better as the expansions come out, but are by no means the best around. And just look at those subscriptions.

[juansfalcin]

I don't know why you guys keep complaining about pudding faces.

Sure, the ones that EA makes are ugly as hell, but that's EA's thing. My sims are pretty, and witty and bright, and if yours aren't, that's because you're not really good at the game, sorry.

[Lenne224]

Well, there is already a shuttle in TS3, they might as well make it go up in space every now and then for maybe a sim week. It shouldn't be very often and maybe there could be a risk of the sim never returning. For sports, instead of non-descript matches at the stadium, we could have things like swimming and diving competitions in the swimming pool, maybe even water polo. In TS2 we had the skating rinks, if they bring them back we could have figure skating, speed skating, ice hockey. We could have boxing matches and wrestling. Martial arts could be considered a sports career. We could have aerobics competitions and aerobics instructors. Swimming instructors. For team sports they don't have to reflect RL number of players or rules, There could be just 2-3 players for each team. We could have sim football and basketball! Golf could return too. Sims or teams could become more famous depending on the number of matches they won. For the movies career, we already have the movie set and props, they should enable sims to use them. They did in in TS1 so it shouldn't be too hard to do this again, I think.


As for the space shuttel, sure it could go up once in a while, but it would still be a rabbithole, and its would be rather cool to have them go all missing on us for like 90 sims days. And the sports career looks to be well football to me, and also how would you script these events in say water polo? if the whole household was a team then yes it would be doable, but it would be kinda random on how the game played out if it was only one sim that was controlled. Pro golfer could become a ambitions sort of career would not be hard, because all you really need in golf is a caddie and another sim to play against.( would most likely just try it and move on) Most of the things you are suggesting would fit better to a online sims game with a open world, and not in a single player based game like we have now. Because we cant controll the whole town all the time, when we want.


I also wanna say that World of warcraft looks horrible if you dont have an ok pc to run it on, and it will still lag allot, due to what you said about them updating graphics. My old laptop met the requrement for the Burning Crusade, when wrath of the lich king came I had to get a new pc, since the old one could not run it properly on low settings annymore, So even in a game like wow where the graphics are not to good, we still need to update due to graphic updates blizzard makes.

[ElementMK]

My sims are pretty, and witty and bright, and if yours aren't, that's because you're not really good at the game, sorry.I have no idea how you managed to sound so pretentious despite talking about your Sims.

[suzetter]

I think there is a misconception about Rabbit Holes:

Players against Rabbit Holes DO NOT necessarily want to go to work with their Sims. I hate Rabbit Holes and I don't want want to go to work with my Sims either. And for the most part those Ambitions jobs get monotonous pretty fast.

Rabbit Holes don't necessarily save resources and active lots don't suck up so many resources either. Actives lots only effect your game when you're playing them. And unless you use mods to countermand it, the game will only allow as many Sims on the lot as your system can tolerate which is why some players get 4 sims at the clubs and some get 12 or more.

What sucks up resources is all the useless background nonesense, like SP, townies hanging ariound their empty homes, and not to mention the game generating a zillion text messages in the form of "John thinks Jane is being rude" , "Jane think John is being flirty", "See Spot run. Run Spot, run." (obviously the TS3 team is either unable to animate facial expressions or assumes players would be too stupid to understand the facial expressions) and let's not forget the thrilling opportunities like "Would your level 10 star like to be a bouncer tonight at the Cineplex?", "Could your -0- pt handiness skill Sim fix the school boiler?". This is the junk that sucks up resources. I hate townies and am only interested in them showing up as NPCs to fill service jobs. I really don't need them to exist outside of that function. Seriously, I'm only interested in playing the sims I create.

TS3 graphics are pretty but the game play is lackluster at best. Building in TS3 is good and CAS/CAST are the best things about the game.

Reading discussions on this forum, I think most people find TS3 good and bad though some people repeatedly complain about anyone that has an issue with TS3 and are adamant that everyone should think its great like they do. I don't get why some players are so invested in being defenders of the EA realm. Weird that.

However, players do have to put their money were their mouth is if they mean what they say.

Since TS1 I have always bought the EPs around the time they came out and occassionally purchased an SP. I have not bought any SPs for TS3 because I didn't think they were a good enough effort to interest me and I have yet to buy Generations because they gave no new town and made the treehouse a rabbit hole and the prom an RH event. WTF?!

I recently had an opportunity to play Generations and I don't feel I'm missing much by not having it. Also, the doll is simultaneously annoying and creepy. Frankly, the new additions read and sounded better than they played out in game and I don't feel I'm missing anything by not having it. I didn't think that EP was worth even $10. However, when its $10 (and it will be) I might buy it for the objects. Seriously, if EA wants to see the color of my money again they are going to have to do lot better than they have been doing.

I have recently put TS2 back on my PC. I play sims on TS2 and mainly build on TS3. I try playing Sims on TS3 but its dull so the Sim playing sessions never last very long. I really enjoy the animated liveliness of TS2. Though I prefer to build in TS3. So I play both now.

And I agree with AngelScott that EA has been on a downward spiral with TS3.

[anifromid2]

It seems that so many people hate the rabbit holes, and one that seems most often mentioned is the hospital. I'm sure these folks have wonderful visions of what the open concept hospital will be like, but allow me to present my vision of what EA would actually provide:

Dr. Sim enters the hospital to find 4 or 5 patients waiting in the waiting room. Player clicks on Judy Bunch. Click "Diagnose". Dr. Sim inserts thermometer into Judy Bunch's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Judy's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Judy Bunch's mouth. "Patient is cured." Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on River McIrish. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into River McIrish's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs River's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into River McIrish's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on Christopher Steel. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into Christopher Steel's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Christophers wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Christopher Steel's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on Zelda Mae. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into Zelda Mae's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Zelda Mae's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Zelda Mae's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.


Dr Sim gets promotion, now goes through the whole routine, but has option of medicine bottle or injection to the heinie.

Sorry, bored me to tears just typing it, I'd hate to actually have to play it over and over and over, rinse and repeat. I actually prefer: "Dr Sim goes to work at hospital, Player fills coffee cup, empties bladder, returns to send Dr. Sim to the bookstore to buy eggs machiavellian recipe"

[WoohooAndTheCity]

It seems that so many people hate the rabbit holes, and one that seems most often mentioned is the hospital. I'm sure these folks have wonderful visions of what the open concept hospital will be like, but allow me to present my vision of what EA would actually provide:

Dr. Sim enters the hospital to find 4 or 5 patients waiting in the waiting room. Player clicks on Judy Bunch. Click "Diagnose". Dr. Sim inserts thermometer into Judy Bunch's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Judy's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Judy Bunch's mouth. "Patient is cured." Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on River McIrish. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into River McIrish's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs River's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into River McIrish's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on Christopher Steel. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into Christopher Steel's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Christophers wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Christopher Steel's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on Zelda Mae. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into Zelda Mae's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Zelda Mae's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Zelda Mae's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.


Dr Sim gets promotion, now goes through the whole routine, but has option of medicine bottle or injection to the heinie.

Sorry, bored me to tears just typing it, I'd hate to actually have to play it over and over and over, rinse and repeat. I actually prefer: "Dr Sim goes to work at hospital, Player fills coffee cup, empties bladder, returns to send Dr. Sim to the bookstore to buy eggs machiavellian recipe"

If done right, there would be no clicking necessary.

In OFB you don't have to keep clicking employees over and over again. Once assigned a job they will continue to do it as long as they are in a good mood and paid fairly.

[fairycake89]

If done right, Zelda Mae wouldn't be getting that thermometer orally ... If done right, Zelda Mae would simply get a prescription for the hairdressers ...

[anifromid2]

For "if done right" I refer you to the professions in Sims Medieval. Cute the first 20 times or so, but mind numbing in their repetition. I don't really think Sims would do anything differently. That said, I do love the idea of a "Nice and Easy" prescription for Zelda Mae.

[juansfalcin]

I have no idea how you managed to sound so pretentious despite talking about your Sims.

It's not about being pretentious.

My point was to say that people complain about pudding faces because they don't know how to work with the game sliders. It is possible to make pretty looking sims in TS3, but noobs keep complaining anyway, since their sims are fugly. Since you are complaining, the shoes seemed to fit anyways. If the shoe fits, wear it, right?

[Misty_2004]

Wow! What an interesting discussion to start reading when I should be heading off to bed. Now my brain is going to be whirring until the really wee hours of the morning. :faceslap:

Anyway, I think both sides of this debate have merit.

Let's start off with the Sims. TS2 has pretty cartoony looking Sims but at least to me they're lovable. They have silly expressions, goofy smiles, and the whole nine yards. Because the way the sliders worked it was pretty easy to end up with some really weird looking Sims but before long the player learned who to let breed with whom and that was pretty much a thing of the past.

TS3 Sims are definitely more realistic looking, and in ways I like them as well. The in-game skins, however, are absolute crap. I've yet to find much about them that is endearing the way TS2 Sims were. There's also one really big problem in that if the game generates families to move into a town, they don't just look similar, but without mods every one of those Sims has an identical face. Now THAT is Uncanny Valley.

I don't mind at all that Sims go to their jobs in rabbit holes. What I do mind is not having a real restaurant. Bear in mind I don't yet have LN installed (I finally picked it up cheap on eBay but haven't felt like installing it yet) so to me it feels like there is very little in the way of real entertainment venues, very much like base-game TS2 was. You had to pretty much pretend when it came to making places for Sims to eat out and such. I very much enjoyed my Sims being able to go on dates after Nightlife for TS2. I try to take a TS3 Sim on a date and the evening's gone before they do anything at all.

After OFB for TS2 came out I couldn't get enough of it. I played and played that expansion pack and when last I was playing (sometime before TS3 came out) I even had a family set up with a Legacy challenge I created focusing on running home businesses based on their Free Time pre-destined hobbies. It was a hoot! I have plans of getting back to that too, just as soon as I manage to get TS2 installed on this computer. I didn't have enough room for both games on my old machine and haven't had time since I got this one to get it installed.

That whole cash register thing Calli was talking about is completely annoying. It's the WA registers Sims are strapped to 24/7. I started a Sim in a fresh town and decided he was going to romance the clerk at the nectary after he met her there one day. Nothing doing! He could go and talk to her but she could never come over because she was always working. The Ambitions register for the Consignment Store is the only one that lets a Sim get off work.

There are things about the gameplay in TS3 that I love. I really enjoy collecting and micro-managing every aspect of at least some of the Sims that live in a household I'm playing. I may micro-manage anywhere from one to six, just depending on my mood. Sadly, though, I've never even managed to play through a single generation in TS3 compared to getting up to six generations in TS2 before that neighborhood went all FBVFS because I was ignorant and moved a family in and didn't yet know how that processed worked with the memories and former relationships. Of course that neighborhood was also the one where the gardener bug struck, in that all of a sudden I had over seventy gardeners in that neighborhood. I have so many fond memories of that family and I still miss them.

I think the gardening system in TS3 is vastly improved over TS2, as is fishing (I love real life gardening and fishing so I do a lot of that in my TS3 game when I play). I also don't miss weather--at all. I hated how without mods my TS2 Sims were always getting over-heated and how during autumn I had to get rid of trees in order for them to have time to do anything but rake leaves. That just stunk.

One of the reasons I haven't progressed in TS3 is because of Create-a-World. I downloaded it a couple of months after it was released and since then I've always had to make a choice about whether I wanted to work on my world or play my game because every time EA sneezes, C-A-W ends up not working. I can't play it without mods, and prefer to use awesomemod, but Pescado puts that expiration date in it so usually I opt for taking a few minutes here and there to work on my world instead of being able to play my game as I would like. Then when I finally do get to update my game I spend hours just downloading the patches. Last time I had several updates to catch up on, so I was downloading, trouble-shooting, and installing patches for six hours. That's just ridiculous.

I really miss making custom content for TS2. I've never had the time to learn to mesh and I stink at making Sims so I retexture stuff and make walls and floors. While I really enjoy TS3's CaSt tool, it's just not the same thing. I can't pop out of my game and create exactly the wallpaper I need for a building project. Instead I'm stuck going through who knows how many copies of the same useless wall then going through hundreds of patterns trying to find the right one for it, and then it doesn't work quite right.

One of the biggest things in all of this for me is the lack of a quality product from EA. They were going downhill badly during TS2 and I almost didn't even buy TS3 but then I decided to give it a shot. It's fun in many ways, but for me it's lacking the magic of TS2. I miss the cute toddlers and bathing them. TS2 toddlers and children were always unique but the meshes for those in TS3 have so few differences that most of the time they're nearly identical until they turn into teens.

I have a love/hate relationship with the updates that come out for the expansion and stuff packs (why we need updates for stuff packs is completely beyond me anyway). On the one hand, it's great to have the extra build options without having to buy an expansion pack if that's all I'm interested in, but on the other hand the updates are usually buggy.

Then there's the cost vs. the quality. I am amazed at the number of people who are willing to hand over $40 every six months for a broken toy. Considering all the bugs, TS3 expansion packs aren't worth more than $20 and I won't pay more than that for them, either.

Out of all I was reading, there was one comment that really struck a cord with me:

Well, I've been a customer of EA since 1995-ish. And back then, you put your money down and actually got a very good game. Bugs weren't an issue, gameplay was good, or you wouldn't play it more than once, and you certainly wouldn't put more money out on other EA titles. This whole franchise has been sliding downhill, EA doesn't want to invest the money it would take to pay people to put in the hours and hours it would take to make a good, stable game anymore. As for a Sims 4? I'm seriously beginning to doubt there will be one.

I resemble that remark. I started buying Maxis games in the late nineties. I played SimCity 2000 and had all the expansions for it, I played SimTown to death, my son played SimAnt until just recently, and those three games barely scratch the surface of our Sim game collection. As far as I'm concerned, even if EA does carry on with Sims 4 they'll most likely be carrying on without me. I'm just plain tired of their incompetence.

[WoohooAndTheCity]

For "if done right" I refer you to the professions in Sims Medieval. Cute the first 20 times or so, but mind numbing in their repetition. I don't really think Sims would do anything differently. That said, I do love the idea of a "Nice and Easy" prescription for Zelda Mae.

That's why I suggested improving the AI.

[ElementMK]

Lord, there's a lot to read in this thread. Say what you will about the quality of my rant, but it sure caused quite a discussion.

Misty, I know I'm probably being jaded once more, but I have to agree with you on the way EA ruins IPs (especially Maxis', for some reason). I shouldn't have to point any further than the rift between the damn near perfect game that was SimCity 4 and the SimCity-That-Must-Not-Be-Named.

... Societies.

[TMBrandon]

Lord, there's a lot to read in this thread. Say what you will about the quality of my rant, but it sure caused quite a discussion.

Misty, I know I'm probably being jaded once more, but I have to agree with you on the way EA ruins IPs (especially Maxis', for some reason). I shouldn't have to point any further than the rift between the damn near perfect game that was SimCity 4 and the SimCity-That-Must-Not-Be-Named.

... Societies.

Please, don't start with societies. That game is just $%@#.

But at least CitiesXL makes up for the lack of good City Simulations lately :)

[ElementMK]

I'd say almost, but not quite. The UI is absolutely terrible, and while the world certainly looks pretty, the mechanics of building a city are complex and often nonsensical. Despite playing the game for months, I would still see a city of any size suddenly fall apart like Detroit in a day. The online feature could have been so much more awesome than it turned out. It's a shame that the game sold so poorly that it bankrupted the developer, though.

[Kathwynn]

It seems that so many people hate the rabbit holes, and one that seems most often mentioned is the hospital. I'm sure these folks have wonderful visions of what the open concept hospital will be like, but allow me to present my vision of what EA would actually provide:

Dr. Sim enters the hospital to find 4 or 5 patients waiting in the waiting room. Player clicks on Judy Bunch. Click "Diagnose". Dr. Sim inserts thermometer into Judy Bunch's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Judy's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Judy Bunch's mouth. "Patient is cured." Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on River McIrish. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into River McIrish's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs River's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into River McIrish's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on Christopher Steel. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into Christopher Steel's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Christophers wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Christopher Steel's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.

Player clicks on Zelda Mae. Click "Diagnose". Dr Sim inserts thermometer into Zelda Mae's mouth. Looks confused. Pulls out thermometer and reinserts it. Pulls out thermometer and looks at it. Reacts. Grabs Zelda Mae's wrist to check pulse. Reacts. Inserts bottle of medicine into Zelda Mae's mouth. "Patient is cured". Simoleons added to family inventory.


Dr Sim gets promotion, now goes through the whole routine, but has option of medicine bottle or injection to the heinie.

Sorry, bored me to tears just typing it, I'd hate to actually have to play it over and over and over, rinse and repeat. I actually prefer: "Dr Sim goes to work at hospital, Player fills coffee cup, empties bladder, returns to send Dr. Sim to the bookstore to buy eggs machiavellian recipe"

You forgot kick sim in shin.. :rofl: :faceslap:

[Misty_2004]

Yeah, not to get this topic on the city builder that must not be named but I actually like that for when I want some very simple gaming pleasure without giving it a lot of thought. (Of course I like Minecraft for the very same reason.) A SimCity substitute, the aforementioned EA wannabe is not. If I had been one of the people who paid $50 for that game when it came out I think I'd have been close to picketing on EA's doorstep. SC4, on the other hand, is a game for which I have a ton of cool user-created mods, can spend absolutely hours working on and tweaking one small city section, and basically can get lost in it. I haven't played it in ages, partially due to a lack of time, and partially because my cities would eventually lag my old computer, which was actually a new computer sometime AFTER SC4 came out. I'm definitely planning on reinstalling it on this machine when I can, and may one day even finish building my region.

Jaded is a good thing in my opinion, and I'm definitely one who is not wasting my shopping dollars on EA's profit margin. I'll buy new at discount, or even used although it may mean not being able to register the expansion pack, but since buying TS3 the day of release I haven't paid full price for anything else for that game and have no plans for doing that in the future.

Shoot, that reminds me. I've got to start looking for a good copy of Apartment Life since I never bought that for TS2. There are a couple of stuff packs for it I should look for as well. So much to do, so little time.

[ac220]

If done right, there would be no clicking necessary.

In OFB you don't have to keep clicking employees over and over again. Once assigned a job they will continue to do it as long as they are in a good mood and paid fairly.
So, we get just a display of Dr. Sim doing those actions instead... Which is, well, a rabbithole by another name. (If you did any OFB jobs yourself instead of delegating to employees, many of them were as clickety-clicky as the imaginary medicine career in question.)

And the issue with all those anti-rabbithole rants anifromid2 pointed out still stands. Ok, poof! Rabbitholes are gone. What next? Instead of just sending as sim to a rabbithole and basically forgetting about them, concentrating on other household members, you at the very best would get too many interesting things happening at once in different parts of the town (quite frequent complaint about AMB jobs) or well, a boring thing halfway across the map that still requires player's full attention.

[WoohooAndTheCity]

So, we get just a display of Dr. Sim doing those actions instead... Which is, well, a rabbithole by another name. (If you did any OFB jobs yourself instead of delegating to employees, many of them were as clickety-clicky as the imaginary medicine career in question.)

And the issue with all those anti-rabbithole rants anifromid2 pointed out still stands. Ok, poof! Rabbitholes are gone. What next? Instead of just sending as sim to a rabbithole and basically forgetting about them, concentrating on other household members, you at the very best would get too many interesting things happening at once in different parts of the town (quite frequent complaint about AMB jobs) or well, a boring thing halfway across the map that still requires player's full attention.

First of all, watching the doctor perform those actions is not the same as watching a motionless neigborhood object.

And secondly, have you played OFB? The jobs were not as "clickety-clicky" as you would like to believe. Once you hire employees and assign them jobs they will continue to work as long as you pay them fairly and give them reasonable hours.

If by "doing the job yourself" you mean having the business owner do everything instead of hiring employees, it would make sense for it to be difficult. Because not everyone can do everything all on their own.

In a hospital it makes sense to have employees.

[aeval99]

First, it kept the game from tumbling into something known as uncanny valley, a concept that says an emulation of a human being that is almost accurate actually ends up being ugly and somewhat unsettling. We've all seen this before (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_n6KT9nukU#t=00m56s). Instead, the “Sims” of The Sims 2 are stylized and cartoonish enough to avoid uncanny valley, but they're still appealing and obviously people.
Considering that the very first mods for Sims 3 were for more realistic eyes and skintones, I don't think Sims have to worry about even being in the same zip code as the Uncanny Valley.

Thank CHRIST the EPs had redeemed the game and brought the entire Sims Series from the abyss. Ambitions,Generations and World Adventures did things that we never thought possible in The Sims, Late Night brought back many things we love about The Sims and I'm praying to every single Catholic saint that Pets is the best EP yet.
Who is this we? You can't have been speaking on my behalf because other than instruments I found nothing useful about LN. I couldn't care less about apartments, nightclubs, celebrities or sickly-looking, shiny, yellow vampires.

It's always easy to go and say about an old game how considered the company was about their customers because they made their game so low end everybody could play it. But how well a game plays, should be compared to what the technology was back then.
I remember when Hot Date came out my game was absolutely unplayable. I had to double my ram from 32MB to a whopping 64MB, BUT I could finally leave my home lot!

And I remember the bitching and moaning when Seasons was released, it seemed like half the people on this forum did not have computers that could use the new features. Rose coloured glasses indeed!

And just for fun: my Sims 2 CC folder was three times larger than the entire hard drive was on my first computer (circa 1997).

[simsample]

I remember when Hot Date came out my game was absolutely unplayable. I had to double my ram from 32MB to a whopping 64MB, BUT I could finally leave my home lot!
:rofl: I had to buy a new hard drive, I filled up my 4GB one with Sims 1!

[TMBrandon]

Who is this we? You can't have been speaking on my behalf because other than instruments I found nothing useful about LN. I couldn't care less about apartments, nightclubs, celebrities or sickly-looking, shiny, yellow vampires.


Before I reply, I want to say sorry to fraroc for post this reply to the reply to his reply(if that makes sense LOL)

Anywho, must I say you sure seemed as you cared about apartments and nightclubs and other non-rabbit hole things in your first post..And the few after that..

[Lenne224]

:rofl: I had to buy a new hard drive, I filled up my 4GB one with Sims 1!

Haha I had the same problem back in those days, well when vecation came out atlest, then there was no room on my parents pc to install it, so I went into the system files and started deleting the big system files, did not go well, we had to get windows 98 reinstalled, and when I then could install the game, it went really really slow, think I sat for like 15min just for the first loading screen xD

[aeval99]

Before I reply, I want to say sorry to fraroc for post this reply to the reply to his reply(if that makes sense LOL)

Anywho, must I say you sure seemed as you cared about apartments and nightclubs and other non-rabbit hole things in your first post..And the few after that..
I'm confused. Are you answering me, or Fraroc? If you meant that for me, then I think you might be a little confused too. That was my first post in this thread, and this (http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?p=3367084#post3367084) is my review of LN from November 2010. I think you will find that my opinion has changed very little since then. And I'm still waiting for someone to nix that nasty overlay.

Yeah, not to get this topic on the city builder that must not be named but I actually like that for when I want some very simple gaming pleasure without giving it a lot of thought. (Of course I like Minecraft for the very same reason.) A SimCity substitute, the aforementioned EA wannabe is not. If I had been one of the people who paid $50 for that game when it came out I think I'd have been close to picketing on EA's doorstep.
I don't regret paying full price for it and I found it to be a thoroughly enjoyable game. It just wasn't meant to be SC5, it was a different game completely and many people could never get past that fact. I liked SC3 but was frustrated by SC4, which was an amazing simulator, but I found it lacking as a "game". I found Societies to be a fun way to kill an evening and build a whole city in one go rather than being a month long project. It saddens me that many people never judged it on what it was, rather than what it wasn't. It also killed the company that made it, which was a big blow for fans of the ancient city-builder type games, as TM was the last developer of games in that genre. :(

Edited to add URL.

[ac220]

And secondly, have you played OFB?
Have you? There is that little job called SALES... If you don't want your star rating to tank because the assigned employee keeps pestering a grumpy customer who definitely isn't going to buy anything, and/or if you indeed want to use those owner perks from sales track you had to do it all by yourself. Restocking was fairly clicky too, although it isn't as critical. Manning the register/crafting/styling weren't.

As for your other point, well, it's all cost/benefit... Yes, it's totally worth it to spend a lot of animator and coder man-hours on some background action a significant proportion of player would watch for 10 minutes then ignore and treat exactly as if it were a rabbithole. In a perfect world, that is...

Although in a perfect world, they wouldn't make it just a background animation. Someone would have come up with some gameplay idea that while not requiring you to constantly monitor several places at once to prevent some simstupidity would still allow you to make decisions and exercise control... Like, I don't know, ability to set how hard your sim works, whether they chat with their colleagues, and maybe an ability to do short little tasks outside the rabbithole to further enhance one's performance... Oh, wait...

All right, a lot of the potential of this tone-and-opportunity system is wasted in the basegame, but if LN movie studio is of any indication EA does get better at designing career rabbitholes.

And rabbitholes are in fact animated. Granted, these are blink-and-you-miss-it little stuff, but it's there.

[ani_]

:rofl: I had to buy a new hard drive, I filled up my 4GB one with Sims 1!

I would have probably killed for 4GB. I didn't have internet at home in the olden days, so I would download stuff at school and put them into diskettes and then take them home to my game. My most precious item was a love-bed, that was meshed to look like a normal bed. I didn't like the tackiness of the original love bed. The bed in question was so big I had to split the zip up into 4 parts, and put one part/diskette and then re-assemble it at home into one zip. Not really the good old days elders like to go back into.

[Miko09]

Have you? There is that little job called SALES... If you don't want your star rating to tank because the assigned employee keeps pestering a grumpy customer who definitely isn't going to buy anything, and/or if you indeed want to use those owner perks from sales track you had to do it all by yourself. Restocking was fairly clicky too, although it isn't as critical. Manning the register/crafting/styling weren't.

As for your other point, well, it's all cost/benefit... Yes, it's totally worth it to spend a lot of animator and coder man-hours on some background action a significant proportion of player would watch for 10 minutes then ignore and treat exactly as if it were a rabbithole. In a perfect world, that is...

Although in a perfect world, they wouldn't make it just a background animation. Someone would have come up with some gameplay idea that while not requiring you to constantly monitor several places at once to prevent some simstupidity would still allow you to make decisions and exercise control... Like, I don't know, ability to set how hard your sim works, whether they chat with their colleagues, and maybe an ability to do short little tasks outside the rabbithole to further enhance one's performance... Oh, wait...

All right, a lot of the potential of this tone-and-opportunity system is wasted in the basegame, but if LN movie studio is of any indication EA does get better at designing career rabbitholes.

And rabbitholes are in fact animated. Granted, these are blink-and-you-miss-it little stuff, but it's there.

That's funny...this same exact logic can be applied to the whole relationship panel thing that people complain about. Why spend a lot of animator and coder man-hours on some background action a significant proportion of player would watch for 10 minutes then ignore when EA can just put text messages in the upper right corner telling the player exactly how the Sims feel. Makes sense, right?

Even though a nice amount of players would get tired of the micromanaging of businesses in a micromanagement simulation game, that doesnt mean there are people who don't thoroughly enjoy it.

The sales system would obviously need a little bit of a revamp to adjust to the new open neighborhood rule and make so the player doesn't have to jump from business to business all the time. Almost everything that has been taken from Sims 2 has needed a tweak here and there. Actually if you look closely, there's all types of artifacts that indicate there was going to be something similar to the business system we had in TS2. Tons of work clothes that have nothing to with the AMB jobs, being able to declare self employment, etc. I guess it didn't work out and in the end we have consignment shops. It may not a perfect world, but at $40 an expansion pack, it would be nice to get a little more effort.

[TMBrandon]

I'm confused. Are you answering me, or Fraroc? If you meant that for me, then I think you might be a little confused too. That was my first post in this thread, and this (http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?p=3367084#post3367084) is my review of LN from November 2010. I think you will find that my opinion has changed very little since then. And I'm still waiting for someone to nix that nasty overlay.




My mistake, last night I read your name as Element Leaf, and I thought she said that. LOL

[WoohooAndTheCity]

Have you? There is that little job called SALES... If you don't want your star rating to tank because the assigned employee keeps pestering a grumpy customer who definitely isn't going to buy anything, and/or if you indeed want to use those owner perks from sales track you had to do it all by yourself. Restocking was fairly clicky too, although it isn't as critical. Manning the register/crafting/styling weren't.

As for your other point, well, it's all cost/benefit... Yes, it's totally worth it to spend a lot of animator and coder man-hours on some background action a significant proportion of player would watch for 10 minutes then ignore and treat exactly as if it were a rabbithole. In a perfect world, that is...

Although in a perfect world, they wouldn't make it just a background animation. Someone would have come up with some gameplay idea that while not requiring you to constantly monitor several places at once to prevent some simstupidity would still allow you to make decisions and exercise control... Like, I don't know, ability to set how hard your sim works, whether they chat with their colleagues, and maybe an ability to do short little tasks outside the rabbithole to further enhance one's performance... Oh, wait...

All right, a lot of the potential of this tone-and-opportunity system is wasted in the basegame, but if LN movie studio is of any indication EA does get better at designing career rabbitholes.

And rabbitholes are in fact animated. Granted, these are blink-and-you-miss-it little stuff, but it's there.

You are looking at everything from the business owner's perspective. Have you ever gone to a business lot in OFB as a visitor? If you had, you would have noticed that employees did jobs they were assigned to do without YOUR control.

I once had a business in the Sims 2 where I had the owner assign an employee to restock the shelves. The employee continued to do this even when I visited the lot as a customer. Your issue with sales and customers being upset with your staff has more to do with the AI than anything else. Just because one aspect of business upsets you doesn't mean we have to get rid of business entirely.

If something is wrong with a feature, fix it. Don't get rid of it.

And if the rabbithole animations are blink-and-you-miss then perhaps they weren't worth watching to begin with.

[ac220]

That's funny...this same exact logic can be applied to the whole relationship panel thing that people complain about. Why spend a lot of animator and coder man-hours on some background action a significant proportion of player would watch for 10 minutes then ignore when EA can just put text messages in the upper right corner telling the player exactly how the Sims feel. Makes sense, right?
Well, there are two objections. First is technical.
Actually, most of the difficulty in opening up rabbitholes would be caused by open neighborhood, - you'd need extra sims to man all the positions in an open rabbithole, a lot of them, to avoid "too many chiefs, too little Indians" instances. (if all the'hood sims in Business are CEOs who does all the other jobs in there? ) If the rabbithole serves customers, you similarly need to get steady stream of customers (and LN bars show you all the potential problems with that little bit,) sim animations should be timed just so that some meanigful work could be done while sim is at work, - no magical community lot time freeze to allow for even a little discrepancy.

There are none of those problems with stuff that happens just between two or three sims, - theis is much more straightforward task.

The second...

Ok, those are my unsubstantiated and unscientific gut feelings, but I think those aren't really compatible. Regular jobs were always, well, just a place to send a sim away from the lot to get a few simoleons and a cool widget or something, and little else, with an OPTION to get oneself more involved in "making simoleons" part present in some form. Socials of all kinds weren't optional. They are the "meat" of the game. From woohoos to fistcuffs, from "I wonder what kind of baby those two would produce" to "I want to make a sim millionaire" to "I want this sim to SUFFER!!!! MWAHAHAHA!" managing socials was an essential part of achieving those goals, half of TS2 aspirations were heavily based on socials, with most people watching themin minute details.

And, well, although I'm usually fairly lenient to the EA to the point of being accused of fanboiism, this part of the TS3 is done wrongety-wrong. It's beyond recovery, it should be thrown out and re-done from scratch. Romance? Garbage. More than half of the interactions gated by traits/LTRs? What were they smoking? The whole rigmarole of "not repeating oneself to not to appear boring?" Hey, it's me, the player, who decides what is and isn't boring, not a stupid piece of code. Animations are worse than they were in TS1! Astrology? Facepalm. Celebrities? Half-baked at best. Seriously, this is the worst part of the whole game when it should be the one that got most of the love and care.

Or, in other words, if they'd really do what I want to the socials in the game, above-mentioned issue would've been the least difficult thing to do. Seriously, from the animations to game mechanics it's all wrong with no redeeming features whatsoever.

Back in the world of playing with cards one's dealt... No, sorry, it's too depressing. There are some cool things and ingenious ideas in TS3, but that's not one of them, and EA clearly isn't getting it. Instead of making the whole system more free-flowing they keep adding hoops to jump through to it, like romantic reputation. :( At least some of the new animations are cool... But, like LN dances, they may or may not be gated to traits. :faceslap: :cry:

[ac220]

You are looking at everything from the business owner's perspective. Have you ever gone to a business lot in OFB as a visitor? If you had, you would have noticed that employees did jobs they were assigned to do without YOUR control.

I once had a business in the Sims 2 where I had the owner assign an employee to restock the shelves. The employee continued to do this even when I visited the lot as a customer.
Well, of course I'm looking at it from the "worker" as opposed to "visitor" perspective. Visiting shops, etc. is clearly an awesome gameplay boost, and it could be done with some tweaks, as WA cash registers and LN bars demonstrate. (and with a rabbithole doors/rugs mod to not to break careers/opportunities this kind of a semi-open rabbithole can be built in-game right now. ) Problems start when playable sims begin to appear on the both sides of the equation.

As I said, keeping current mechanics with just added eye candy seems to make very little sense to me from the developer's point of view, so, if they do it at all, there should be some kind of new job mechanics to it, one that most people either like better or could live with.

Your issue with sales and customers being upset with your staff has more to do with the AI than anything else. Just because one aspect of business upsets you doesn't mean we have to get rid of business entirely.

If something is wrong with a feature, fix it. Don't get rid of it.

And if the rabbithole animations are blink-and-you-miss then perhaps they weren't worth watching to begin with.
Well, if they couldn't get it quite right having all the advantages of TS2 (from a clearly superior dev team to a much more lenient mechanics of non-open neighbourhood) my confidence in them getting it right without those advantages is... Non-existent. Current system is good enough, and while I'd like it to be better as much as anyone else I'm very afraid they 1) make it even worse by monkeying with it. 2) Spend valuable resources they could've spend somewhere where they can make genuine improvements.

[emilyhwithlove]

Shouldn't this be posted in the TS2 section, because obviously the guy who made this thread hates TS3 and most TS2ers would probably agree with it more than the TS3 lovers.

[Metaisho]

I know this opinion is pretty unpopular, and I'm not trying to step on any toes, but why do people still rag on the rabbitholes? They're probably not going anywhere at this point, and EA's clear attempt to fix some of it in Ambitions was largely a drag. I really don't think I'm the only one who sees it that way. I still haven't played a firefighter or let my doctor go out on the town to deal with patients, because it's really not my idea of fun to chase my sim around and manually make them do their job. I care even less to sit and watch them do the same stuff over and over. If a sim is painting, I go somewhere else. If a sim is practicing any skill (athletic, mixology, gardening, logic), I go somewhere else. If a sim is reading, I go somewhere else.

I honestly can't envision the opening of rabbitholes anything more than a shiny set of animations that represent "work" skill, that get dull and boring over a short period of time. I'm glad they're not open; imagine how much the rest of the game would have suffered if they had to flesh out all those convenient work-holes around the town.

[rian90]

Metaisho, You are reading an 'uber rant' where everyone complains. Try some of the other threads. I think a lot of people share your opinion. It is very difficult to run families with two people in open careers and many of us like the rabbitholes because we can play other members of the family while one is at work earning the money. :) I have a feeling it comes down to playing style. Right now, we have a choice which is good. EA seems to have balanced open careers with rabbitholes and I think it is going to stay this way for the rest of the EPs.

[Honeywell]

I think people "rag on the rabbit holes" so much simply because there's too much tell and not enough show in the Sims 3 in general and the rabbit holes bear the brunt of the complaints simply because they're the most noticeable. Just my opinion.

[rian90]

I think people "rag on the rabbit holes" so much simply because there's too much tell and not enough show in the Sims 3 in general and the rabbit holes bear the brunt of the complaints simply because they're the most noticeable. Just my opinion.

Agree. There are a lot of places where EA could have given us more, but career rabbitholes are probably not the best place. But the feeling that this game just isn't quite enough is there..just can't quite put one's finger on the problem.

[ElementMK]

Shouldn't this be posted in the TS2 section, because obviously the guy who made this thread hates TS3 and most TS2ers would probably agree with it more than the TS3 lovers.Because this is about TS3 affecting a potential TS4, using things done right in TS2 as supporting points.

Besides, why would I care about everyone agreeing with me? It's more about the discussion, anyway.

[TMBrandon]

Because this is about TS3 affecting a potential TS4, using things done right in TS2 as supporting points.

Besides, why would I care about everyone agreeing with me? It's more about the discussion, anyway.

If this is, about what you'd like to see in a TS4 to make it potential or anything really about anything in TS4, then somebody made a thread about that:
http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=447202&goto=lastpost

But this thread to me came off more as a "I hate TS3" or "TS2 is better" it never really came off as potential to see in TS4..Some of those things that you did list in TS2 had some of their own flaws which I believe TS3 will pick up on or has picked up on. Hopefully..But my idea for a TS4 is to be a completely new design..I wouldn't really want a single thing to come back, I want something new for a change, such as just one game, and updates to add items or expansions..

[rian90]

Brandon, there seems to be a lot of this. Another thread a guy asked what was best. TS2 or TS3 and then continues to argue with anyone who says TS3! LOL

Not sure why there has to be a contest. I think they did a lot of great things in TS2 and in TS3 and failed a lot on both. Bugs were in both, we had to wait for patches for far too long, promised tools never materialized (although TS3 is a bit better with a world builder), and if you think back, many were disappointed in TS2 EPs and TS3 EPs for a variety of reasons. Neither game is going to please everyone and these silly comparisons between games seem weird to me. Better to compare EPs that are similar, such as WA to Bon Voyage and Ambitions to OFB. That would make much more sense to me. Some say the base pack for TS3 had less 'stuff' when it included gardening and other features that TS2 base game did not. TS2 may have felt as though it had more but probably because it was more full of objects and items.

It almost feels as if people have to justify why they hate TS3 and continue to play TS2, which is rather silly. TS2 is a good game in and of itself and no one has to play TS3. But if they choose not to play it, why do they have to come here and try to prove why TS2 is better? LOL I don't get it. As for influencing TS4, I am not sure that will happen. I have a feeling TS4 will have it's own focus, probably more on building objects in-game and building than the other games based on the little info leaked.

[WoohooAndTheCity]

Well, of course I'm looking at it from the "worker" as opposed to "visitor" perspective. Visiting shops, etc. is clearly an awesome gameplay boost, and it could be done with some tweaks, as WA cash registers and LN bars demonstrate. (and with a rabbithole doors/rugs mod to not to break careers/opportunities this kind of a semi-open rabbithole can be built in-game right now. ) Problems start when playable sims begin to appear on the both sides of the equation.

As I said, keeping current mechanics with just added eye candy seems to make very little sense to me from the developer's point of view, so, if they do it at all, there should be some kind of new job mechanics to it, one that most people either like better or could live with.

The reason I brought that up is because you kept saying that there was too much clicking going on and I think that's only an issue if:

A - Your business owner can't afford a full staff
B - You haven't assigned your employees jobs

In OFB if you pay your employees well and tell them what to do you no longer have to worry about having to control them.

The WA registers only make sense in a shop setting and even then they do not offer much. Players try to make restaurants work with the WA registers but it just isn't the same without chefs, servers and a host/hostess. If I wanted a fancy restaurant I would only be able to make it look like a fancy restaurant but it is basically just a cafeteria with expensive chairs and tables.

Well, if they couldn't get it quite right having all the advantages of TS2 (from a clearly superior dev team to a much more lenient mechanics of non-open neighbourhood) my confidence in them getting it right without those advantages is... Non-existent. Current system is good enough, and while I'd like it to be better as much as anyone else I'm very afraid they 1) make it even worse by monkeying with it. 2) Spend valuable resources they could've spend somewhere where they can make genuine improvements.

So instead of hoping the developers would figure out a way to make it work you simply accept the idea that they are incompetent and can never come up with anything better than what they've got now?

And here I thought it was us whiners who were cynical. We probably have more faith in EA than the die-hards. We complain because we hope and expect for things to get better.

We don't simply nod our heads and say, "That's just how it is."

[TMBrandon]

Brandon, there seems to be a lot of this. Another thread a guy asked what was best. TS2 or TS3 and then continues to argue with anyone who says TS3! LOL

Not sure why there has to be a contest. I think they did a lot of great things in TS2 and in TS3 and failed a lot on both. Bugs were in both, we had to wait for patches for far too long, promised tools never materialized (although TS3 is a bit better with a world builder), and if you think back, many were disappointed in TS2 EPs and TS3 EPs for a variety of reasons. Neither game is going to please everyone and these silly comparisons between games seem weird to me. Better to compare EPs that are similar, such as WA to Bon Voyage and Ambitions to OFB. That would make much more sense to me. Some say the base pack for TS3 had less 'stuff' when it included gardening and other features that TS2 base game did not. TS2 may have felt as though it had more but probably because it was more full of objects and items.

It almost feels as if people have to justify why they hate TS3 and continue to play TS2, which is rather silly. TS2 is a good game in and of itself and no one has to play TS3. But if they choose not to play it, why do they have to come here and try to prove why TS2 is better? LOL I don't get it. As for influencing TS4, I am not sure that will happen. I have a feeling TS4 will have it's own focus, probably more on building objects in-game and building than the other games based on the little info leaked.

I must agree 100%. The one thing that just really urkes me in the debates of TS2 and TS3, or the comparison is when they bring up talk of sports..And activities, I mean there is a very good amount of activities you can do in the Sims 3, just put your self to it..And you can't really bring up talk of Sports when there's only a football for us to play catch and I'm sure they'll bring it out sooner or later in a Weather EP or something like that. And I agree on the EP thing as well, you can't take all of TS2 EP's and Compare them to one or the entire TS3 series because not all the EP's are out and there may be one that's not going to be done, like the University EP rumor thing, that it's not happening. But even OFB to Ambitions can't be fully compared since Ambitions didn't add as much as OFB but it's probably the closest. But will have to wait and see what they'll do.

[Ranissa]

In OFB if you pay your employees well and tell them what to do you no longer have to worry about having to control them.

I never understood this way of looking at OFB and especially not in light of the comparisons often drawn between OFB businesses and rabbit holes. Okay, so I can buy an OFB business, stick a bunch of Townies in it, put them to work and then ... ignore it. How is that any different than a rabbit hole? Sure, I can walk into it but the only thing I can do as a customer is buy stuff and talk to people. Sure, it's a pretty venue at which to look and perhaps in which to take photos but ... what other purpose does it serve?

I disliked OFB. It was my least favorite of all of the TS2 expacs. Other than the objects and some of the new animations it brought to the game, micro-managing a business was boring as poop. Make sure your employees get breaks, which often last much longer than they should. Oh, wait, that shelf is empty and your employee who stocks is on break, better click ... oh, wait, you're out of the stuff to out on that shelf. Yeah, no. The only thing I ever did in my OFB businesses was create a cute place to take pictures of my families.

[Miko09]

I never understood this way of looking at OFB and especially not in light of the comparisons often drawn between OFB businesses and rabbit holes. Okay, so I can buy an OFB business, stick a bunch of Townies in it, put them to work and then ... ignore it. How is that any different than a rabbit hole? Sure, I can walk into it but the only thing I can do as a customer is buy stuff and talk to people. Sure, it's a pretty venue at which to look and perhaps in which to take photos but ... what other purpose does it serve?

I disliked OFB. It was my least favorite of all of the TS2 expacs. Other than the objects and some of the new animations it brought to the game, micro-managing a business was boring as poop. Make sure your employees get breaks, which often last much longer than they should. Oh, wait, that shelf is empty and your employee who stocks is on break, better click ... oh, wait, you're out of the stuff to out on that shelf. Yeah, no. The only thing I ever did in my OFB businesses was create a cute place to take pictures of my families.

If you didn't like the EP, you're obviously not going to understand why there are individuals who would want some of those features back. That's what I'm starting to believe the line between the two sides are: people who liked OFB and those individuals who didn't. People who didn't like OFB aren't going to want the micromanaging "boringness" back with all it's exhausting "clicking" and will be perfectly fine shuffling their sim into a rabbithole and pointing their attention elsewhere. Career rabbitholes are needed, but what's so bad about a sim owning a functional restaurant? A register that emits plates of food does not count. What about a shop to sell homemade items? We have all these craftables but all we can really do is sell them to the middle man at the consignment shop.

Also with a business versus a rabbithole, it's a place that your sim can control. Fire/hire employees, choose your selling product, fix the interior/exterior to your liking, woo customers into buying your wares, have the satisfaction of knowing your products can be owned by members of the town, etc. I already know there are ways of achieving faux stores/eateries through mods and other accessible ways. Heck, I've pretty much tried them all. It would be nice if simmers didn't have to do such a workaround for something so close to being obtainable.

[ElementMK]

http://thumbs2.modthesims.info/img/3/1/6/9/9/6/3/MTS2_EsmeraldaF_1062284_TS2_servo.jpg

OFB had these guys. If you hate OFB, you haven't met the Servo.

[ani_]

OFB had these guys. If you hate OFB, you haven't met the Servo. I liked OFB but hated the servos.

One of the biggest challenges that an OFB type of EP would bring into an open world is getting enough revenue to not bankrupt the lot owner. In TS2 if you sold items from buy mode, making money was easy, but if you tried to run a restaurant, then it was very hard. That's why I did hire a full staff into the restaurant, so when I visited it with other playable Sims, the lot was usable, but when I played the owner, I did everything myself. At least in the beginning. If I had family members in the household that could help, I would take them with me. Or, if I needed help, but didn't have family members to do it, I would call the employees to work, then send all but one back home.

With a full staff at work, I was spending more money on pay than I was getting from sold meals. When I played other households, I would visit the restaurant, eat and exit, I wouldn't linger on the lot because the employees were getting paid hourly but customers were not eating and paying at the same pace.

Now imagine this in an open hood where the lot owner is getting charged 8h/day for every person working for him, at least my town doesn't have enough people to keep the revenue in the plus, specially if I have more than 1 restaurant in the town. Or, if I have multiple shops, and I have to pay the employees.

I still want an OFB type of business, but I hope EA thinks it through very carefully, and doesn't make a quick fix to the problem so that all money exchanged between people is magical. It should come from the owner's/customers' pocket.

[ac220]

The reason I brought that up is because you kept saying that there was too much clicking going on and I think that's only an issue if:

A - Your business owner can't afford a full staff
B - You haven't assigned your employees jobs

In OFB if you pay your employees well and tell them what to do you no longer have to worry about having to control them.

The WA registers only make sense in a shop setting and even then they do not offer much. Players try to make restaurants work with the WA registers but it just isn't the same without chefs, servers and a host/hostess. If I wanted a fancy restaurant I would only be able to make it look like a fancy restaurant but it is basically just a cafeteria with expensive chairs and tables.



So instead of hoping the developers would figure out a way to make it work you simply accept the idea that they are incompetent and can never come up with anything better than what they've got now?

And here I thought it was us whiners who were cynical. We probably have more faith in EA than the die-hards. We complain because we hope and expect for things to get better.

We don't simply nod our heads and say, "That's just how it is."
Re OFB. Ok, we probably have very different playstyles. I like to babysit my sims and make them act 100% efficient. If you can set up a profitable business that just runs itself, well, more power to you. But, frankly I just don't see myself being able to exercise the same level of control I'm accustomed to in OFB in an open neighborhood without going completely nuts.

Re cynicism. I'm not a die-hard. I just sort of feel a professional solidarity with the devs (even though I never worked for a game company.) I know how gruellingly hard and ungrateful their job may be, especially at a place like EA. So, the least I can do is to try to be as fair as possible, give credit where it's due, and give benefit of doubt and congratulate them on any job that is, in my opinion, well done.

Having said that, I have some experience of software development, been there, done that, and what I see in TS3 does look rather mediocre overall. Some moments of design genius, yes. Good interface, yes. Neat features like CAST, yes. Real, consistent, quality... Not so much. Their vision of where TS3 should go... Well, see my rant on the previous page. I hope the new management would be able to improve things, but it's too early to tell.

So, since I see a good, working, gameplay system with a sound design reasoning behind it, a system I personally enjoy, I indeed would prefer this particular team to leave it alone. Had it been a different team... Well, it would have been a different game.

That's what I'm starting to believe the line between the two sides are: people who liked OFB and those individuals who didn't.
Or, probably those who liked AMB careers and multi-sim travels and those who didn't. I have little against micromanagement in TS2. Doing it while zooming around in a huge open hood, though...